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BY 

ANTHONY  TRO 


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(gnglisl)  ilTcn  of  Ccttcra 

EDITED  BY  JOHN  MORLEY 


THACKEEAY 


BY 


ANTHONY  TROLLOPS 


NEW    YORK 

HAKPER    &    BROTHERS,    PUBLISHERS 


FRANKLIN      SQUARE 


CLA-ikJi^^ 


ENGLISH   MEN   OF  LETTERS. 

Edited  by  John  Morley. 


Johnson Leslie  Stephen. 

Gibbon J.  C.  Morison. 

Scott R-  H.  Hutton. 

Shhlley J.  A.  Symonds. 

Hume T.  H.  Huxley. 

Goldsmith William  Black. 

Defoe William  Minto. 

Burns J   C.  Shairp. 

Spenser R.  W.  Church. 

Thackeray Anthony  Trollope. 

Burke John  Morley. 

Milton Mark  Pattison. 

Hawthorns Henry  James,  Jr. 

SouTHHY E.  Dowden. 

Chaucer A.  W.  Ward. 

Bunyan J.  A.  Froude. 

CovvpER Goldwin   Smith. 

Pope Leslie  Stephen. 

Byron John  Nichol. 


Locke Thomas  Fowler. 

Wordsworth F.  Myers. 

Dryden G.  Saintsbury. 

Landor Sidney  Colvin. 

De  Quincey David  Masson. 

Lamb Alfred  Ainger- 

Bentley R.  C.  Jebb. 

Dickens ...A.  W.  Ward. 

Gray E.  W.  Gosse. 

Swift Leslie  Stephen. 

Sterne H.  D.  Traill. 

Macaulay J.  Cotter  Morison. 

Fielding Austin  Dobson. 

Sheridan  Mrs.  Oliphant. 

Addison W  J.  Courthope. 

Bacon R.  W.  Church. 

Coleridge H.  D.  Traill. 

SiK  Philip  Sid.ney.  .  .J.  A.  Symonds. 
Keats Sidney  Colvin. 


i2mo,  Cloth,  75  cents  per  volume. 
Other  volumes  in  preparation. 


Published  by  HARPER  &  BROTHERS,  New  York. 

^~  Any  of  the  ahcve  7Vorks  will  be  sent  by  mail,  fostnge  prepaid,  to  any  part 
of  the  United  States  or  Canada,  on  receipt  o/  tlu  price. 


CONTENTS. 


CHAPTER  I. 

PAGfl 
BlOGRAPHICAI. .        1 


CHAPTER  II. 
Fraser's  Magazizne  and  Punch 61 

CHAPTER  III. 
Vanity  Fair .89 

CHAPTER  IV. 
Pendennis  and  The  Newcomes 106 

CHAPTER  V. 
Esmond  and  The  Virginians 119 

CHAPTER   VI. 
Thackeray's  Burlesques 136 


M6*d2VA}t    . 


Ti  CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER  VIL 

TAQK 

Thackeray's  Lectures 151 

CHAPTER  Vni. 
Thackeray's  Bali^vds 165 

CHAPTER   IX. 
Thackeray's  Style  and  Manner  of  Work  ....    181 


THACKERAY. 

CHAPTER  I. 

BIOGRAPHICAL. 

In  the  foregoing  volumes  of  this  series  of  English  Men 
of  Letters^  and  in  other  works  of  a  similar  nature  which 
have  appeared  lately  as  to  the  Ancient  Classics  and  For- 
eign Classics,  biography  has  naturally  been,  if  not  the  lead- 
ing, at  any  rate  a  considerable  element.  The  desire  is 
common  to  all  readers  to  know  not  only  what  a  great 
writer  has  written,  but  also  of  what  nature  has  been  the 
man  who  has  produced  such  great  work.  As  to  all  the 
authors  taken  in  hand  before,  there  has  been  extant  some 
written  record  of  the  man's  life.  Biographical  details 
have  been  more  or  less  known  to  the  world,  so  that, 
whether  of  a  Cicero,  or  of  a  Goethe,  or  of  our  own  John- 
son, there  has  been  a  story  to  tell.  Of  Thackeray  no  life 
has  been  written;  and  though  they  who  knew  him  —  and 
possibly  many  who  did  not  —  are  conversant  with  anec- 
dotes of  the  man,  who  was  one  so  well  known  in  society  as 
to  have  created  many  anecdotes,  yet  there  has  been  no  me- 
moir of  his  life  sufficient  to  supply  the  wants  of  even  so 
small  a  work  as  this  purports  to  be.     For  this  the  reason 

1* 


2  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

may  simply  be  told.  Thackeray,  not  long  before  his 
death,  had  had  his  taste  offended  by  some  fulsome  biogra- 
phy. -Paragraphs,  of  which  the  eulogy  seemed  to  have 
been  the  produce  rather  of  personal  love  than  of  inquiry 
or  judgment,  disgusted  him,  and  he  begged  of  his  girls 
that  when  he  should  have  gone  there  should  nothing  of 
the  sort  be  done  with  his  name. 

We  can  imagine  how  his  mind  had  worked,  how  he  had 
declared  to  himself  that,  as  by  those  loving  hands  into 
which  his  letters,  his  notes,  his  little  details — his  literary 
remains,  as  such  documents  used  to  be  called — might  nat- 
urally fall,  truth  of  his  foibles  and  of  his  shortcomings 
could  not  be  told,  so  should  not  his  praises  be  written,  or 
that  flattering  portrait  be  limned  which  biographers  are 
w^ont  to  produce.  Acting  upon  these  instructions,  his 
daughters — while  there  were  two  living,  and  since  that  the 
one  surviving — have  carried  out  the  order  which  has  ap- 
peared to  them  to  be  sacred.  Such  being  the  case,  it  cer- 
tainly is  not  my  purpose  now  to  write  what  may  be  called 
a  life  of  Thackeray.  In  this  preliminary  chapter  I  will 
give  such  incidents  and  anecdotes  of  his  life  as  will  tell 
the  reader  perhaps  all  about  him  that  a  reader  is  entitled 
to  ask.  I  will  tell  how  he  became  an  author,  and  will  say 
how  first  he  worked  and  struggled,  and  then  how  he  work- 
ed and  prospered,  and  became  a  household  word  in  Eng- 
lish literature ;  how,  in  this  way,  he  passed  through  that 
course  of  mingled  failure  and  success  which,  though  the 
literary  aspirant  may  suffer,  is  probably  better  both  for  the 
writer  and  for  the  writings  than  unclouded  early  glory. 
The  suffering,  no  doubt,  is  acute,  and  a  touch  of  melancholy, 
perhaps  of  indignation,  may  be  given  to  words  which  have 
been  written  while  the  heart  has  been  too  full  of  its  own 
wrongs ;  but  this  is  better  than  the  continued  note  of  tri' 


I.]  BIOGRAPHICAL.  3 

umph,  which  is  still  heard  in  the  final  voices  of  the  spoilt 
child  of  literature,  even  when  they  are  losing  their  music. 
Then  I  will  tell  how  Thackeray  died,  early  indeed,  but  still 
having  done  a  good  life's  work.  Something  of  his  man- 
ner, something  of  his  appearance  I  can  say,  something  per- 
haps of  his  condition  of  mind ;  because  for  some  years  he 
was  known  to  me.  But  of  the  continual  intercourse  of 
himself  with  the  world,  and  of  himself  with  his  own  works, 
I  can  tell  little,  because  no  record  of  his  life  has  been  made 
public. 

William  Makepeace  Thackeray  was  born  at  Calcutta,  on 
July  18,  1811.  His  father  was  Eichmond  Thackeray,  son 
of  W.  M.  Thackeray  of  Hadley,  near  Barnet,  in  Middlesex. 
A  relation  of  his,  of  the  same  name,  a  Rev.  Mr.  Thackeray, 
I  knew  well  as  rector  of  Hadley,  many  years  afterwards. 
Him  I  believe  to  have  been  a  second  cousin  of  our  Thack- 
eray, but  I  think  they  had  never  met  each  other.  Anoth- 
er cousin  was  Provost  of  Kings  at  Cambridge,  fifty  years 
ago,  as  Cambridge  men  will  remember.  Clergymen  of  the 
family  have  been  numerous  in  England  during  the  century  ; 
and  there  was  one,  a  Rev.  Elias  Thackeray,  whom  I  also 
knew  in  my  youth,  a  dignitary,  if  I  remember  right,  in  the 
diocese  of  Meath.  The  Thackerays  seem  to  have  affected 
the  Church ;  but  such  was  not  at  any  period  of  his  life  the 
bias  of  our  novelist's  mind. 

His  father  and  grandfather  were  Indian  civil  servants. 
His  mother  was  Anne  Becher,  whose  father  was  also  in 
the  Company's  service.  She  married  early  in  India,  and 
was  only  nineteen  when  her  son  was  born.  She  was  left 
a  widow  in  1816,  with  only  one  child,  and  was  married  a 
few  years  afterwards  to  Major  Henry  Carmichael  Smyth, 
with  whom  Thackeray  lived  on  terms  of  affectionate  inter- 
course till  the  major  died.     All  who  knew  "William  Make- 


4  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

peace  remember  his  raotlier  well,  a  handsome,  spare,  gray- 
haired  lady,  whom  Thackeray  treated  with  a  courtly  def- 
erence  as  well  as  constant  affection.  There  was,  however, 
something  of  discrepancy  between  them  as  to  matters  of 
religion,  Mrs.  Carmichael  Smyth  was  disposed  to  the 
somewhat  austere  observance  of  the  evangelical  section  of 
the  Church.  Such,  certainly,  never  became  the  case  with 
her  son.  There  was  disagreement  on  the  subject,  and 
probably  unhappiness  at  intervals,  but  never,  I  think,  quar- 
relling. Thackeray's  house  was  his  mother's  home  when- 
ever she  pleased  it,  and  the  home  also  of  his  stepfather. 

He  was  brought  a  child  from  India,  and  was  sent  early  to 
the  Charter  House.  Of  his  life  and  doings  there  his  friend 
and  school-fellow  George  Yenables  writes  to  me  as  follows: 

"  My  recollection  of  him,  though  fresh  enough,  does  not 
furnish  much  material  for  biography.  He  came  to  school 
young  —  a  pretty,  gentle,  and  rather  timid  boy.  I  think 
his  experience  there  was  not  generally  pleasant.  Though 
he  had  afterwards  a  scholarlike  knowledge  of  Latin,  he  did 
not  attain  distinction  in  the  school ;  and  I  should  think 
that  the  character  of  the  head-master.  Dr.  Russell,  which 
was  vigorous,  unsympathetic,  and  stern,  though  not  severe, 
was  uncongenial  to  his  own.  With  the  boys  who  knew 
him,  Thackeray  was  popular ;  but  he  had  no  skill  in  games, 
and,  I  think,  no  taste  for  them.  .  .  .  He  was  already  known 
by  his  faculty  of  making  verses,  chiefly  parodies.  I  only 
remember  one  line  of  one  parody  on  a  poem  of  L.  E.  L.'s, 
about  '  Violets,  dark  blue  violets ;'  Thackeray's  version 
was  *  Cabbages,  bright  green  cabbages,'  and  we  thought  it 
very  witty.  He  took  part  in  a  scheme,  which  came  to 
nothing,  for  a  school  magazine,  and  he  wrote  verses  for  it, 
of  which  I  only  remember  that  they  were  good  of  their 


I.]  BIOGRAPHICAL.  5 

kind.  When  I  knew  him  better,  in  later  years,  I  thought 
I  could  recocrnize  the  sensitive  nature  which  he  had  as  a 
boy.  .  .  .  His  change  of  retrospective  feeling  about  his 
school  days  was  very  characteristic.  In  his  earlier  books 
he  always  spoke  of  the  Charter  House  as  Slaughter  House 
and  Smithfield.  As  he  became  famous  and  prosperous  his 
memory  softened,  and  Slaughter  House  was  changed  into 
Grey  Friars,  where  Colonel  Newcome  ended  his  life." 

In  February,  1829,  when  he  was  not  as  yet  eighteen, 
Thackeray  went  up  to  Trinity  College,  Cambridge,  and 
was,  I  think,  removed  in  1830.  It  may  be  presumed, 
therefore,  that  his  studies  there  were  not  very  serviceable 
to  him.  There  are  few,  if  any,  records  left  of  his  doings 
at  the  university — unless  it  be  the  fact  that  he  did  there 
commence  the  literary  work  of  his  life.  The  line  about 
the  cabbages,  and  the  scheme  of  the  school  magazine,  can 
hardly  be  said  to  have  amounted  even  to  a  commence- 
ment. In  1829  a  little  periodical  was  brought  out  at 
Cambridge,  called  The  Snoh,  with  an  assurance  on  the 
title  that  it  was  not  conducted  by  members  of  the  univer- 
sity. It  is  presumed  that  Thackeray  took  a  hand  in  edit- 
ing this.  He  certainly  wrote,  and  published  in  the  little 
paper,  some  burlesque  lines  on  the  subject  which  was 
given  for  the  Chancellor's  prize  poem  of  the  year.  This 
was  Timbuctoo,  and  Tennyson  was  the  victor  on  the  occa- 
sion. There  is  some  good  fun  in  the  four  first  and  foui 
last  lines  of  Thackeray's  production. 

In  Africa — a  quarter  of  the  world — 
Men's  skins  are  black ;  their  hair  is  crisped  and  curled  ; 
And  somewhere  there,  unknown  to  public  view, 
A  mighty  city  lies,  called  Timbuctoo. 
«  )K  »  *  If  *  « 


6  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

I  see  her  tribes  the  hill  of  glory  mount, 
And  sell  their  sugars  on  their  own  account ; 
While  round  her  throne  the  prostrate  nations  come, 
Sue  for  her  rice,  and  barter  for  her  rum. 

I  cannot  find  in  The  Snob  internal  evidence  of  much 
literary  merit  beyond  this.  But  then  how  many  great 
"writers  have  there  been  from  whose  early  lucubrations  no 
future  literary  excellence  could  be  prognosticated  ? 

There  is  something  at  any  rate  in  the  name  of  the  pub- 
lication which  tells  of  work  that  did  come.  Thackeray's 
mind  was  at  all  times  peculiarly  exercised  with  a  sense  of 
snobbishness.  His  appreciation  of  the  vice  grew  abnor- 
mally, so  that  at  last  he  had  a  morbid  horror  of  a  snob — 
a  morbid  fear  lest  this  or  the  other  man  should  turn  snob 
on  his  hands.  It  is  probable  that  the  idea  was  taken  from 
the  early  Siiob  at  Cambridge,  either  from  his  own  partici- 
pation in  the  work  or  from  his  remembrance  of  it.  The 
Snob  lived,  I  think,  but  nine  weeks,  and  was  followed  at 
an  interval,  in  1830,  by  The  Gownsman,  which  lived  to 
the  seventeenth  number,  and  at  the  opening  of  which 
Thackeray  no  doubt  had  a  hand.  It  professed  to  be  a 
continuation  of  The  Snob.  It  contains  a  dedication  to  all 
proctors,  which  I  should  not  be  sorry  to  attribute  to  him. 
"  To  all  Proctors,  past,  present,  and  future — 

Whose  taste  it  is  our  privilege  to  follow, 
Wliose  virtue  it  is  our  duty  to  imitate, 
Whose  presence  it  is  our  interest  to  avoid." 

There  is,  however,  nothing  beyond  fancy  to  induce  me  to 
believe  that  Thackeray  was  the  author  of  the  dedication, 
and  I  do  not  know  that  there  is  any  evidence  to  show  that 
he  was  connected  with  The  Snob  beyond  the  writing  of 
Timbuctoo. 


l]  biographical.  1 

In  1830  he  left  Cambridge,  and  went  to  Weimar  eithet 
5n  that  year  or  in  1831.  Between  Weimar  and  Paris  he 
spent  some  portion  of  his  earlier  years,  while  his  family — 
his  mother,  that  is,  and  his  stepfather  —  were  living  in 
Devonshire.  It  was  then  the  purport  of  his  life  to  be- 
come an  artist,  and  he  studied  drawing  at  Paris,  affecting 
especially  Bonnington,  the  young  English  artist  who  had 
himself  painted  at  Paris,  and  who  had  died  in  1828.  He 
never  learned  to  draw — perhaps  never  could  have  learned. 
That  he  was  idle,  and  did  not  do  his  best,  we  may  take 
for  granted.  He  was  always  idle,  and  only  on  some  occa- 
sions, when  the  spirit  moved  him  thoroughly,  did  he  do 
his  best  even  in  after-life.  But  with  drawing — or  rather 
without  it — he  did  wonderfully  well  even  when  he  did  his 
worst.  He  did  illustrate  his  own  books,  and  everyone 
knows  how  incorrect  were  his  delineations.  But  as  illus- 
trations they  were  excellent.  How  often  have  I  wished 
that  characters  of  my  own  creating  might  be  sketched  as 
faultily,  if  with  the  same  appreciation  of  the  intended  pur- 
pose. Let  anyone  look  at  the  "  plates,"  as  they  are  called 
in  Vanity  Fair^  and  compare  each  with  the  scenes  and 
the  characters  intended  to  be  displayed,  and  there  see 
whether  the  artist — if  we  may  call  him  so — has  not  man- 
aged to  convey  in  the  picture  the  exact  feeling  which  he 
has  described  in  the  text.  I  have  a  little  sketch  of  his,  in 
which  a  cannon-ball  is  supposed  to  have  just  carried  off 
the  head  of  an  aide-de-camp — messenger  I  had  perhaps 
better  say,  lest  I  might  affront  military  feelings — who  is 
kneeling  on  the  field  of  battle  and  delivering  a  despatch 
to  Marlborough  on  horseback.  The  graceful  ease  w^ith 
which  the  duke  receives  the  message  though  the  messen- 
ger's head  be  gone,  and  the  soldier-like  precision  with 
which  the  headless  hero  finishes  his  last  effort  of  militarjf 


8  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

obedience,  may  not  have  been  portrayed  with  well-drawn 
figures,  but  no  finished  illustration  ever  told  its  story  bet- 
ter. Dickens  has  informed  us  that  he  first  met  Thackeray 
in  1835,  on  which  occasion  the  young  artist  aspirant,  look- 
ing no  doubt  after  profitable  employment,  "  proposed  to 
become  the  illustrator  of  my  earliest  book."  It  is  singu- 
lar that  such  should  have  been  the  first  interview  between 
the  two  great  novelists.  We  may  presume  that  the  offer 
was  rejected. 

In  1832,  Thackeray  came  of  age,  and  inherited  his  fort- 
une—  as  to  which  various  stories  have  been  told.  It 
seems  to  have  amounted  to  about  five  hundred  a  year,  and 
to  have  passed  through  his  hands  in  a  year  or  two,  interest 
and  principal.  It  has  been  told  of  him  that  it  was  all 
taken  away  from  him  at  cards,  but  such  w\is  not  the  truth. 
Some  went  in  an  Indian  bank  in  which  he  invested  it. 
A  portion  was  lost  at  cards.  But  with  some  of  it — the 
larger  part,  as  I  think — he  endeavoured,  in  concert  with 
his  stepfather,  to  float  a  newspaper,  which  failed.  There 
seem  to  have  been  two  newspapers  in  which  he  was  so 
concerned.  The  National  Standard  and  The  Constitutional. 
On  the  latter  he  was  engaged  with  his  stepfather,  and  in 
carrying  that  on  he  lost  the  last  of  his  money.  The  Na- 
tional Standard  had  been  running  for  some  weeks  when 
Thackeray  joined  it,  and  lost  his  money  in  it.  It  ran  only 
for  little  more  than  twelve  months,  and  then,  the  money 
having  gone,  the  periodical  came  to  an  end.  I  know  no 
road  to  fortune  more  tempting  to  a  young  man,  or  one 
that  with  more  certainty  leads  to  ruin.  Thackeray,  who 
in  a  way  more  or  less  correct,  often  refers  in  his  writings, 
if  not  to  the  incidents,  at  any  rate  to  the  remembrances  of 
his  own  life,  tells  us  much  of  the  story  of  this  newspaper 
in  Lovel  the  Widoivcr.    "  They  are  welcome,"  says  the  bach* 


I.]  BIOGRAPHICAL  9 

elor,  "  to  make  merry  at  my  charges  in  respect  of  a  certain 
bargain  which  I  made  on  coming  to  London,  and  in  which, 
had  I  been  Moses  Primrose  purchasing  green  spectacles,  I 
could  scarcely  have  been  more  taken  in.  My  Jenkinson  was 
an  old  college  acquaintance,  whom  I  was  idiot  enough  to 
imagine  a  respectable  man.  The  fellow  had  a  very  smooth 
tongue  and  sleek  sanctified  exterior.  He  was  rather  a 
popular  preacher,  and  used  to  cry  a  good  deal  in  the  pulpit 
He  and  a  queer  wine-merchant  and  bill  discounter,  Sher- 
rick  by  name,  had  somehow  got  possession  of  that  neat  lit- 
tle literary  paper.  The  Museum,  which  perhaps  you  remem- 
ber, and  this  eligible  literary  property  my  friend  Honey- 
man,  with  his  wheedling  tongue,  induced  me  to  purchase." 
Here  is  the  history  of  Thackeray's  money,  told  by  himself 
plainly  enough,  but  with  no  intention  on  his  part  of  nar- 
rating an  incident  in  his  own  life  to  the  public.  But  the 
drollery  of  the  circumstances,  his  own  mingled  folly  and 
young  ambition,  struck  him  as  being  worth  narration,  and 
the  more  forcibly  as  he  remembered  all  the  ins  and  outs  of 
his  own  reflections  at  the  time — how  he  had  meant  to  en- 
chant the  world,  and  make  his  fortune.  There  was  liter- 
ary capital  in  it  of  which  he  could  make  use  after  so  many 
years.  Then  he  tells  us  of  this  ambition,  and  of  the  folly 
of  it;  and  at  the  same  time  puts  forward  the  excuses  to 
be  made  for  it.  "  I  daresay  I  gave  myself  airs  as  editor 
of  that  confounded  Museum,  and  proposed  to  educate 
the  public  taste,  to  diffuse  morality  and  sound  literature 
throughout  the  nation,  and  to  pocket  a  liberal  salary  in 
return  for  my  services.  I  daresay  I  printed  my  own  son- 
nets, my  own  tragedy,  my  own  verses.  ...  I  daresay  I 
wrote  satirical  articles.  ...  I  daresay  I  made  a  gaby  of 
myself  to  the  world.  Pray,  my  good  friend,  hast  thou 
never  done  likewise?     If  thou  hast  never  been  a  fool,  be 


10  THACKERAY.  {chap. 

sure  thou  wilt  never  be  a  wise  man."  Thackeray  was 
quite  aware  of  his  early  weaknesses,  and  in  the  maturity 
of  life  knew  well  that  he  had  not  been  precociously  wise. 
He  delighted  so  to  tell  his  friends,  and  he  delighted  also 
to  tell  the  public,  liot  meaning  that  any  but  an  inner  cir- 
cle should  know  that  he  was  speaking  of  himself.  But 
the  story  now  is  plain  to  all  who  can  read.* 

It  was  thus  that  he  lost  his  money ;  and  then,  not  hav- 
ing prospered  very  wxll  with  his  drawing  lessons  in  Paris 
or  elsewhere,  he  was  fain  to  take  up  literature  as  a  pro- 
fession. It  is  a  business  which  has  its  allurements.  It 
requires  no  capital,  no  special  education,  no  training,  and 
may  be  taken  up  at  any  time  without  a  moment's  delay. 
If  a  man  can  command  a  table,  a  chair,  a  pen,  paper,  and 
ink,  he  can  commence  his  trade  as  literary  man.  It  is 
thus  that  aspirants  generally  do  commence  it.  A  man 
may  or  may  not  have  another  employment  to  back  him, 
or  means  of  his  own ;  or — as  was  the  case  with  Thackeray, 
when,  after  his  first  misadventure,  he  had  to  look  about 
him  for  the  means  of  living  —  he  may  have  nothing  but 
his  intellect  and  liis  friends.  But  the  idea  comes  to  the 
man  that  as  he  has  the  pen  and  ink,  and  time  on  his  hand, 
why  should  he  not  write  and  make  money  ? 

It  is  an  idea  that  comes  to  very  many  men  and  women, 
old  as  well  as  young — to  many  thousands  who  at  last  are 
crushed  by  it,  of  whom  the  world  knows  nothing.     A  man 

*  The  report  that  he  had  lost  all  his  money  and  was  going  to  live 
by  painting  in  Paris,  was  still  prevalent  in  London  in  1836,  Maerea- 
dy,  on  the  27th  April  of  that  year,  says  in  his  Diary:  "At  Garrick 
Club,  where  I  dined  and  eaw  the  papers.  Met  Thackeray,  who  has 
spent  all  his  fortune,  and  is  now  about  to  settle  in  Paris,  I  believe  as 
an  artist."  But  at  this  time  he  was,  in  truth,  turning  to  Utcraturo 
as  a  profession. 


I.]  BIOGRAPHICAL.  11 

can  make  the  attempt  tliougli  he  has  not  a  coat  fit  to  go 
out  into  the  street  with ;  or  a  woman,  though  she  be  almost 
in  rags.  There  is  no  apprenticeship  wanted.  Indeed,  there 
is  no  room  for  such  apprenticeship.  It  is  an  art  which  no 
one  teaches ;  there  is  no  professor  who,  in  a  dozen  lessons, 
even  pretends  to  show  the  aspirant  how  to  write  a  book 
or  an  article.  If  you  would  be  a  watchmaker,  you  must 
learn  ;  or  a  lawyer,  a  cook,  or  even  a  housemaid.  Before 
you  can  clean  a  horse  you  must  go  into  the  stable,  and  be- 
gin at  the  beginning.  Even  the  cab-driving  tiro  must  sit 
for  awhile  on  the  box,  and  learn  something  of  the  streets, 
before  he  can  ply  for  a  fare.  But  the  literary  beginner 
rushes  at  once  at  the  top  rung  of  his  ladder — as  though  a 
youth,  having  made  up  his  mind  to  be  a  clergyman,  should 
demand,  without  preliminary  steps,  to  be  appointed  Bish- 
op of  London.  That  he  should  be  able  to  read  and  write 
is  presumed,  and  that  only.  So  much  may  be  presumed 
of  everyone,  and  nothing  more  is  wanted. 

In  truth  nothing  more  is  wanted — except  those  inner 
lights  as  to  which  so  many  men  live  and  die  without  hav- 
ing learned  whether  they  possess  them  or  not.  Practice, 
industry,  study  of  literature,  cultivation  of  taste,  and  the 
rest,  will  of  course  lend  their  aid,  will  probably  be  neces- 
sary before  high  excellence  is  attained.  But  the  instances 
are  not  to  seek — are  at  the  fingers  of  us  all — in  which  the 
first  uninstructed  effort  has  succeeded.  A  boy,  almost,  or 
perhaps  an  old  w^oman,  has  sat  down  and  the  book  has 
come,  and  the  w^orld  has  read  it,  and  the  booksellers  have 
been  civil  and  have  written  their  cheques.  When  all 
trades,  all  professions,  all  seats  at  offices,  all  employments 
at  which  a  crust  can  be  earned,  are  so  crowded  that  a 
young  man  knows  not  where  to  look  for  the  means  of  live^ 

lihood,  is  there  not  an  attraction  in  this  which  to  the  self* 
B 


12  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

confident  must  be  almost  invincible  ?  The  booksellers  ara 
courteous  and  write  their  cheques,  but  that  is  not  half  the 
whole  ?  Monstrari  digito  !  That  is  obtained.  The  hap- 
py aspirant  is  written  of  in  newspapers,  or,  perhaps,  better 
still,  he  writes  of  others.  When  the  barrister  of  forty-five 
has  hardly  got  a  name  beyond  Chancery  Lane,  this  glori- 
ous young  scribe,  with  the  first  down  on  his  lips,  has  print- 
ed his  novel  and  been  talked  about. 

The  temptation  is  irresistible,  and  thousands  fall  into  it. 
How  is  a  man  to  know  that  he  is  not  the  lucky  one  or  the 
gifted  one  ?  There  is  the  table,  and  there  the  pen  and  ink. 
Among  the  unfortunate,  he  who  fails  altogether  and  from 
the  first  start  is  not  the  most  unfortunate.  A  short  pe- 
riod of  life  is  wasted,  and  a  sharp  pang  is  endured.  Then 
the  disappointed  one  is  relegated  to  the  condition  of  life 
which  he  would  otherwise  have  filled  a  little  earlier.  Ho 
has  been  wounded,  but  not  killed,  or  even  maimed.  But 
he  who  has  a  little  success,  who  succeeds  in  earning  a  few 
halcyon,  but  ah !  so  dangerous  guineas,  is  drawn  into  a 
trade  from  which  he  will  hardly  escape  till  he  be  driven 
from  it,  if  he  come  out  alive,  by  sheer  hunger.  He  hangs 
on  till  the  guineas  become  crowns  and  shillings — till  some 
sad  record  of  his  life,  made  when  he  applies  for  charity, 
declares  that  he  has  worked  hard  for  the  last  year  or  two, 
and  has  earned  less  than  a  policeman  in  the  streets  or  a 
porter  at  a  railway.  It  is  to  that  that  he  is  brought  by 
applying  himself  to  a  business  which  requires  only,  a  table 
and  chair,  with  pen,  ink,  and  paper !  It  is  to  that  which 
lie  is  brought  by  venturing  to  believe  that  he  has  been 
gifted  with  powers  of  imagination,  creation,  and  expres- 
sion. 

The  young  man  who  makes  the  attempt  knows  that  he 
nmst  run  the  chance.     lie  is  well  aware  that  nine  must 


I.]  BIOGRAPHICAL.  13 

fail  where  one  will  make  his  running  good.  So  much  as 
that  does  reach  his  ears,  and  recommends  itself  to  his  com- 
mon-sense. But  why  should  it  not  be  he  as  well  as  an- 
other? There  is  always  some  lucky  one  winning  the 
prize.  And  this  prize  when  it  has  been  won  is  so  well 
worth  the  winning!  He  can  endure  starvation  —  so  he 
tells  himself — as  well  as  another.  He  will  try.  But  yet 
he  knows  that  he  has  but  one  chance  out  of  ten  in  his  fa- 
vour, and  it  is  only  in  his  happier  moments  that  he  flatters 
himself  that  that  remains  to  him.  Then  there  falls  upon 
him — in  the  midst  of  that  labour  which  for  its  success  es- 
pecially requires  that  a  man's  heart  shall  be  light,  and  that 
he  be  always  at  his  best — doubt  and  despair.  If  there  be 
no  chance,  of  what  use  is  his  labor  ? 

Were  it  not  better  done  as  others  use, 
To  sport  with  Amaryllis  in  the  shade, 

and  amuse  himself  after  that  fashion  ?  Thus  the  very  in- 
dustry which  alone  could  give  him  a  chance  is  discarded. 
It  is  so  that  the  vouno;  man  feels  who,  with  some  slia:ht 
belief  in  himself  and  with  many  doubts,  sits  down  to  com- 
mence the  literary  labor  by  which  he  hopes  to  live. 

So  it  was,  no  doubt,  with  Thackeray.  Such  were  his 
hopes  and  his  fears — with  a  resolution  of  which  we  can 
well  understand  that  it  should  have  waned  at  times,  of 
earning  his  bread,  if  he  did  not  make  his  fortune,  in  the 
world  of  literature.  One  has  not  to  look  far  for  evidence 
of  the  condition  I  have  described — that  it  was  so,  Amaryl- 
lis and  all.  How  or  when  he  made  his  very  first  attempt 
in  London,  I  have  not  learned ;  but  he  had  not  probably 
spent  his  money  without  forming  "press"  acquaintances, 
and  had  thus  formed  an  aperture  for  the  tlin  end  of  the 
wedge.      He  wrote  for  The  Constitutional ,  of  which  ho 


14  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

was  part  proprietor,  beginning  his  work  for  that  papci 
as  a  correspondent  from  Paris.  For  awhile  he  was  con- 
nected with  The  Times  newspaper,  though  his  work  there 
did  not,  I  think,  amount  to  much.  His  first  regular  em- 
ployment was  on  Fraser's  Magazine^  when  Mr.  Fraser's 
shop  was  in  Regent  Street,  when  Oliver  Yorke  was  the 
presumed  editor,  and  among  contributors,  Carlyle  was  one 
of  the  most  notable.  I  imagine  that  the  battle  of  life  was 
diflScult  enough  with  him  even  after  he  had  become  one 
of  the  leading  props  of  that  magazine.  All  that  he  wrote 
was  not  taken,  and  all  that  was  taken  was  not  approved. 
In  1837-38,  the  History  of  Samuel  Titmarsh  and  the 
Great  Hoggarty  Diamond  appeared  in  the  magazine.  The 
Great  Hoggarty  Diamond  is  now  known  to  all  readers  of 
Thackeray's  works.  It  is  not  my  purpose  to  speak  spe- 
cially of  it  here,  except  to  assert  that  it  has  been  thought 
to  be  a  great  success.  When  it  was  being  brought  out,  the 
author  told  a  friend  of  his — and  of  mine — that  it  was  not 
much  thought  of  at  Fraser's,  and  that  he  had  been  called 
upon  to  shorten  it.  That  is  an  incident  disagreeable  in  its 
nature  to  any  literary  gentleman,  and  likely  to  be  specially 
so  when  he  knows  that  his  provision  of  bread,  certainly  of 
improved  bread  and  butter,  is  at  stake.  The  man  who 
thus  darkens  his  literary  brow  with  the  frown  of  disap- 
proval, has  at  his  disposal  all  the  loaves  and  all  the  fish- 
es that  are  going.  If  the  writer  be  successful,  there  will 
come  a  time  when  he  will  be  above  such  frowns;  but, 
when  that  opinion  went  forth,  Thackeray  had  not  yet 
made  his  footing  good,  and  the  notice  to  him  respecting  it 
must  have  been  very  bitter.  It  was  in  writing  this  Hog- 
garty Diamond  that  Thackeray  first  invented  the  name 
of  Michael  Angelo  Titmarsh.  Samuel  Titmarsh  was  the 
writer,  whereas  Michael  Angelo  was  an  intending  illustra- 


1.]  BIOGRAPniCAL.  15 

tor.  Thackeray's  nose  had  been  broken  in  a  school  fight, 
while  he  was  quite  a  little  boy,  by  another  little  boy,  at 
the  Charter  House ;  and  there  was  probably  some  associa- 
tion intended  to  be  jocose  with  the  name  of  the  great  art- 
ist, whose  nose  was  broken  by  his  fellow-student  Torrigi- 
ano,  and  who,  as  it  happened,  died  exactly  three  centuries 
before  Thackeray. 

I  can  understand  all  the  disquietude  of  his  heart  when 
that  warning,  as  to  the  too  great  length  of  his  story,  was 
given  to  him.  He  was  not  a  man  capable  of  feeling  at 
any  time  quite  assured  in  his  position,  and  when  that  oc- 
curred he  was  very  far  from  assurance.  I  think  that  at 
no  time  did  he  doubt  the  sufficiency  of  his  own  mental 
qualification  for  the  work  he  had  taken  in  hand ;  but  he 
doubted  all  else.  He  doubted  the  appreciation  of  the 
world  ;  he  doubted  his  fitness  for  turning  his  intellect 
to  valuable  account;  he  doubted  his  physical  capacity — 
dreading  his  own  lack  of  industry ;  he  doubted  his  luck ; 
he  doubted  the  continual  absence  of  some  of  those  mis- 
fortunes on  which  the  works  of  literary  men  are  ship- 
wrecked. Though  he  was  aware  of  his  own  power,  he 
always,  to  the  last,  was  afraid  that  his  own  deficiencies 
should  be  too  strong  against  him.  It  was  his  nature  to 
be  idle — to  put  off  his  work — and  then  to  be  angry  with 
himself  for  putting  it  off.  Ginger  was  hot  in  the  mouth 
with  him,  and  all  the  allurements  of  the  world  were  strong 
upon  him.  To  find  on  Monday  morning  an  excuse  why 
he  should  not  on  Monday  do  Monday's  work  was,  at  the 
time,  an  inexpressible  relief  to  him,  but  had  become  a  deep 
regret — almost  a  remorse — before  the  Monday  was  over. 
To  such  a  one  it  was  not  given  to  believe  in  himself  with 
that  sturdy  rock-bound  foundation  which  we  see  to  have 
belonged  to  some  men  from  the  earliest  struggles  of  their 


16  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

career.  To  him,  then,  must  have  come  an  inexpressible 
pang  when  he  was  told  that  his  story  must  be  curtailed. 

Who  else  would  have  told  such  a  story  of  himself  to 
the  first  acquaintance  he  chanced  to  meet  ?  Of  Thackeray 
it  might  be  predicted  that  he  certainly  would  do  so.  No 
little  wound  of  the  kind  ever  came  to  him  but  what  he 
disclosed  it  at  once.  "  They  have  only  bought  so  many 
of  my  new  book."  "  Have  you  seen  the  abuse  of  my  last 
number  ?"  "  What  am  I  to  turn  my  hand  to  ?  They  are 
getting  tired  of  my  novels."  "  They  don't  read  it,"  ho 
said  to  me  of  Esmond.  "  So  you  don't  mean  to  publish 
my  work?"  he  said  once  to  a  publisher  in  an  open  com- 
pany. Other  men  keep  their  little  troubles  to  themselves. 
I  have  heard  even  of  authors  who  have  declared  how  all 
the  publishers  were  running  after  their  books ;  I  have 
heard  some  discourse  freely  of  their  fourth  and  fifth  edi- 
tions; I  have  known  an  author  to  boast  of  his  thousands 
sold  in  this  country,  and  his  tens  of  thousands  in  Amer- 
ica; but  I  never  heard  anyone  else  declare  that  no  one 
would  read  his  chef-d'oeuvre,  and  that  the  world  was  be- 
coming tired  of  him.  It  was  he  who  said,  when  he  was 
fifty,  that  a  man  past  fifty  should  never  write  a  novel. 

And  yet,  as  I  have  said,  he  was  from  an  early  age  fully 
conscious  of  his  own  ability.  That  he  was  so  is  to  be 
seen  in  the  handling  of  many  of  his  early  works — in  Bar- 
ry  Lyndon,  for  instance,  and  the  Memoirs  of  Mr.  C.  James 
Yelloivplush.  The  sound  is  too  certain  for  doubt  of  that 
kind.  But  he  had  not  then,  nor  did  he  ever  achieve  that 
assurance  of  public  favour  which  makes  a  man  confident 
that  his  work  will  be  successful.  During  the  years  of 
which  we  are  now  speaking  Thackeray  was  a  literary 
Bohemian  in  this  sense — that  he  never  regarded  his  own 
status  as  certain.     While  pcrforminjr  much  of  the  best 


3.]  BIOGRAPHICAL.  17 

of  his  life's  work  he  was  not  sure  of  his  market,  not  cer- 
tain of  his  readers,  his  publishers,  or  his  price ;  nor  was  he 
certain  of  himself. 

It  is  impossible  not  to  form  some  contrast  between  him 
and  Dickens  as  to  this  period  of  his  life — a  comparison 
not  as  to  their  literary  merits,  but  literary  position.  Dick- 
ens was  one  year  his  junior  in  age,  and  at  this  time,  viz., 
1837-38,  had  reached  almost  the  zenith  of  his  reputation. 
Pickwick  had  been  published,  and  Oliver  Twist  and  Nich- 
olas Nicklehy  w^cre  being  published.  All  the  w^orld  was 
talking  about  the  young  author  who  was  assuming  his  po- 
sition with  a  confidence  in  his  own  powers  which  was  fully 
justified  both  by  his  present  and  future  success.  It  was 
manifest  that  he  could  make,  not  only  his  own  fortune, 
but  that  of  his  publishers,  and  that  he  was  a  literary  hero 
bound  to  be  worshipped  by  all  literary  grades  of  men, 
down  to  the  "devils"  of  the  printing  -  oflBce.  At  that 
time  Thackeray,  the  older  man,  was  still  doubting,  still 
hesitating,  still  struggling.  Everyone  then  had  accepted 
the  name  of  Charles  Dickens.  That  of  William  Thack- 
eray was  hardly  known  beyond  the  circle  of  those  who  are 
careful  to  make  themselves  acquainted  with  such  matters. 
It  was  then  the  custom,  more  generally  than  it  is  at  pres- 
ent, to  maintain  anonymous  writing  in  magazines.  Now, 
if  anything  of  special  merit  be  brought  out,  the  name  of 
the  author,  if  not  published,  is  known.  It  was  much  less 
so  at  the  period  in  question ;  and  as  the  world  of  readers 
began  to  be  acquainted  with  Jeames  Yellowplush,  Cath- 
erine Hayes,  and  other  heroes  and  heroines,  the  names  of 
the  author  had  to  be  inquired  for.  I  remember  myself, 
when  I  was  already  well  acquainted  with  the  immortal 
Jeames,  asking  who  was  the  writer.  The  works  of  Charles 
Dickens   were   at  that  time   as  well  known   to   be   his, 

2 


18  THACKERAY.  [chap, 

and  as  widely  read  in  England,  as  those  almost  of  Shake- 
speare. 

It  will  be  said,  of  course,  that  this  came  from  the  earlier 
popularity  of  Dickens.  That  is  of  course ;  but  why  should 
it  have  been  so?  They  had  begun  to  make  their  effort 
much  at  the  same  time ;  and  if  there  was  any  advantage 
in  point  of  position  as  they  commenced,  it  was  with  Thack- 
eray. It  might  be  said  that  the  genius  of  the  one  was 
brighter  than  that  of  the  other,  or,  at  any  rate,  that  it  was 
more  precocious.  But  after- judgment  has,  I  think,  not 
declared  either  of  the  suggestions  to  be  true,  I  will  make 
no  comparison  between  two  such  rivals,  who  were  so  dis- 
tinctly different  from  each,  and  each  of  whom,  within  so 
very  short  a  period,  has  come  to  stand  on  a  pedestal  so 
high  —  the  two  exalted  to  so  equal  a  vocation.  And  if 
Dickens  showed  the  best  of  his  power  early  in  life,  so  did 
Thackeray  the  best  of  his  intellect.  In  no  display  of 
mental  force  did  he  rise  above  Barry  Lyndon.  I  hardly 
know  how  the  teller  of  a  narrative  shall  hope  to  mount 
in  simply  intellectual  faculty  above  the  effort  there  made. 
In  what,  then,  was  the  difference  ?  Why  was  Dickens 
already  a  great  man  when  Thackeray  was  still  a  literary 
Bohemian  ? 

The  answer  is  to  be  found  not  in  the  extent  or  in  the 
nature  of  the  genius  of  cither  man,  but  in  the  condition  of 
mind — which  indeed  may  be  read  plainly  in  their  works 
by  those  who  have  eyes  to  see.  The  one  was  steadfast, 
industrious,  full  of  purpose,  never  doubting  of  himself,  al- 
ways putting  his  best  foot  foremost  and  standing  firmly 
on  it  when  he  got  it  there ;  with  no  inward  trepidation, 
with  no  moments  in  which  he  was  half  inclined  to  think 
that  this  race  was  not  for  his  winning,  this  goal  not  to 
be  reached  by  his  struggles.      The  sympathy  of  friends 


I.]  BIOGR.VPIIICAL.  19 

was  good  to  him,  but  he  could  have  done  without  it.  The 
good  opinion  which  he  had  of  himself  was  never  shaken 
by  adverse  criticism ;  and  the  criticism  on  the  other  side, 
by  which  it  was  exalted,  came  from  the  enumeration  of 
the  number  of  copies  sold.  He  was  a  firm,  reliant  man, 
very  little  prone  to  change,  who,  when  he  had  discovered 
the  nature  of  his  own  talent,  knew  how  to  do  the  very 
best  with  it. 

It  may  almost  be  said  that  Thackeray  was  the  very  op- 
posite of  this.  Unsteadfast,  idle,  changeable  of  purpose, 
aware  of  his  own  intellect  but  not  trusting  it,  no  man  ever 
failed  more  generally  than  he  to  put  his  best  foot  fore- 
most. Full  as  his  works  are  of  pathos,  full  of  humour, 
full  of  love  and  charity,  tending,  as  they  always  do,  to 
truth  and  honour,  and  manly  worth  and  womanly  modes- 
ty, excelling,  as  they  seem  to  me  to  do,  most  other  written 
precepts  that  I  know,  they  always  seem  to  lack  something 
that  might  have  been  there.  There  is  a  touch  of  vague- 
ness which  indicates  that  his  pen  was  not  firm  while  he 
was  using  it.  He  seems  to  me  to  have  been  dreaming  ever 
of  some  high  flight,  and  then  to  have  told  himself,  with  a 
half-broken  heart,  that  it  was  beyond  his  power  to  soar  up 
into  those  bright  regions.  I  can  fancy,  as  the  sheets  went 
from  him  every  day,  he  told  himself,  in  regard  to  every 
sheet,  that  it  was  a  failure.  Dickens  was  quite  sure  of  his 
sheets. 

"  I  have  got  to  make  it  shorter !"  Then  he  would  put 
his  hands  in  his  pockets,  and  stretch  himself,  and  straight- 
en the  lines  of  his  face,  over  which  a  smile  would  come, 
as  though  this  intimation  from  his  editor  were  the  best 
joke  in  the  world ;  and  he  would  walk  away,  with  his  heart 
bleeding,  and  every  nerve  in  an  agony.  There  are  none  of 
us  who  want  to  have  much  of  his  work  shortened  now. 


20  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

In  1837  Thackeray  married  Isabella,  daughter  of  Colonel 
Matthew  Shawe,  and  from  this  union  there  came  three 
daughters,  Anne,  Jane,  and  Harriet.  The  name  of  the 
eldest,  now  Mrs.  Richmond  Ritchie,  who  has  followed  so 
closely  in  her  father's  steps,  is  a  household  word  to  the 
world  of  novel  readers ;  the  second  died  as  a  child ;  the 
younger  lived  to  marry  Leslie  Stephen,  who  is  too  well 
known  for  me  to  say  more  than  that  he  wrote,  the  other 
day,  the  little  volume  on  Dr.  Johnson  in  this  series;  but 
she,  too,  has  now  followed  her  father.  Of  Thackeray's 
married  life  what  need  be  said  shall  be  contained  in  a  very 
few  words.  It  was  grievously  unhappy ;  but  the  misery 
of  it  came  from  God,  and  was  in  no  wise  due  to  human 
fault.  She  became  ill,  and  her  mind  failed  her.  There 
was  a  period  during  which  he  would  not  believe  that  her 
illness  was  more  than  illness,  and  then  he  clung  to  her  and 
waited  on  her  with  an  assiduity  of  affection  which  only 
made  his  task  the  more  painful  to  him.  At  last  it  became 
evident  that  she  should  live  in  the  companionship  of  some 
one  with  whom  her  life  might  be  altogether  quiet,  and' she 
has  since  been  domiciled  with  a  lady  with  whom  she  has 
been  happy.  Thus  she  was,  after  but  a  few  years  of  mar- 
ried life,  taken  away  from  him,  and  he  became,  as  it  were, 
n  widower  till  the  end  of  his  days. 

At  this  period,  and  indeed  for  some  years  after  his  mar- 
riage, his  chief  literary  dependence  was  on  Fraser^s  Maga- 
zine. He  wrote  also  at  this  time  in  the  Ncio  Monthly 
Magazine.  In  1840  he  brought  out  his  Paris  Sketch 
Book,  as  to  which  he  tells  us,  by  a  notice  printed  with  the 
first  edition,  that  half  of  the  sketches  had  already  been 
published  in  various  periodicals.  Here  he  used  the  name 
Michael  Angelo  Titmarsh,  as  he  did  also  with  the  Journey 
from  Cornhill  to  Cairo.     Dickens  had  called  himself  Boz, 


i.]  BIOGRAPHICAL.  21 

and  clang  to  the  name  with  persistency  as  long  as  the 
public  would  permit  it.  Thackeray's  affection  for  assumed 
names  was  more  intermittent,  though  I  doubt  whether 
he  used  his  own  name  altogether  till  it  appeared  on  the 
title-page  of  Vanity  Fair.  About  this  time  began  his 
connection  with  Punch,  in  which  much  of  his  best  work 
appeared.  Looking  back  at  our  old  friend  as  he  used  to 
come  out  from  week  to  week  at  this  time,  we  can  hardly 
boast  that  we  used  to  recognise  how  good  the  literary 
pabulum  was  that  was  then  given  for  our  consumption. 
We  have  to  admit  that  the  ordinary  reader,  as  the  ordinary 
picture-seer,  requires  to  be  gniided  by  a  name.  We  are 
moved  to  absolute  admiration  by  a  Raphael  or  a  Hobbema, 
but  hardly  till  we  have  learned  the  name  of  the  painter, 
or,  at  any  rate,  the  manner  of  his  painting.  I  am  not  sure 
that  all  lovers  of  poetry  would  recognise  a  Lycidas  com- 
ing from  some  hitherto  unknown  Milton.  Gradually  the 
good  picture  or  the  fine  poem  makes  its  way  into  the 
minds  of  a  slowly  discerning  public.  Punch,  no  doubt, 
became  very  popular,  owing,  perhaps,  more  to  Leech,  its 
artist,  than  to  any  other  single  person.  Gradually  the 
world  of  readers  began  to  know  that  there  was  a  speciality 
of  humour  to  be  found  in  its  pages — fun  and  sense,  satire 
and  good-humour,  compressed  together  in  small  literary 
morsels  as  the  nature  of  its  columns  required.  Gradually 
the  name  of  Thackeray  as  one  of  the  band  of  brethren  was 
buzzed  about,  and  gradually  became  known  as  that  of  the 
chief  of  the  literary  brothers.  But  during  the  years  in 
which  he  did  much  for  Punch,  say  from  1843  to  1853, 
he  was  still  struggling  to  make  good  his  footing  in  litera- 
ture. They  knew  him  well  in  the  Punch  office,  and  no 
doubt  the  amount  and  regularity  of  the  cheques  from 
Messrs.  Bradbury  and  Evans,  the  then  and  still  owners  of 


22  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

that  happy  periodical,  made  him  aware  that  he  had  found 
for  himself  a  satisfactory  career.  In  "  a  good  day  for 
himself,  the  journal,  and  the  world,  Thackeray  found 
Punchy  This  was  said  by  his  old  friend  Shirley  Brooks, 
who  himself  lived  to  be  editor  of  the  paper  and  died  in 
harness,  and  was  said  most  truly.  Punch  was  more  con- 
genial to  him,  and  no  doubt  more  generous,  than  Fraser. 
There  was  still  something  of  the  literary  Bohemian  about 
him,  but  not  as  it  had  been  before.  He  was  still  unfixed, 
looking  out  for  some  higher  career,  not  altogether  satisfied 
to  be  no  more  than  one  of  an  anonymous  band  of  broth- 
ers, even  though  the  brothers  were  the  brothers  of  Punch. 
We  can  only  imagine  what  were  his  thoughts  as  to  him- 
self and  that  other  man,  who  was  then  known  as  the 
great  novelist  of  the  day  —  of  a  rivalry  with  whom  he 
was  certainly  conscious.  Punch  was  very  much  to  him, 
but  was  not  quite  enough.  That  must  have  been  very 
clear  to  himself  as  he  meditated  the  beginning  of  Vanity 
Fair. 

Of  the  contributions  to  the  periodical,  the  best  known 
now  arc  The  Snob  PajMrs  and  The  Ballads  of  Police- 
man X.  But  they  were  very  numerous.  Of  Thackeray 
as  a  poet,  or  maker  of  verses,  I  will  say  a  few  words  in  a 
chapter  which  will  be  devoted  to  his  own  so-called  ballads. 
Here  it  seems  only  necessary  to  remark  that  there  was  not 
apparently  any  time  in  his  career  at  which  he  began  to 
think  seriously  of  appearing  before  the  public  as  a  poet. 
Such  was  the  intention  early  in  their  career  with  many  of 
our  best  known  prose  writers,  with  Milton,  and  Goldsmith, 
and  Samuel  Johnson,  with  Scott,  Macaulay,  and  more  lately 
with  Matthew  Arnold ;  writers  of  verse  and  prose  who 
ultimately  prevailed  some  in  one  direction,  and  others  in 
the  other.     Milton  and  Goldsmith  have  been  known  best 


I.]  BIOGRAPHICAL.  23 

as  poets,  Jolmson  and  Macaulay  as  writers  of  prose.  But 
with  all  of  them  there  has  been  a  distinct  effort  in  each 
art.  Thackeray  seems  to  have  tumbled  into  versification 
by  accident;  writing  it  as  amateurs  do,  a  little  now  and 
again  for  his  own  delectation,  and  to  catch  the  taste  of 
partial  friends.  The  reader  feels  that  Thackeray  would 
not  have  begun  to  print  his  verses  unless  the  opportunity 
of  doing  so  had  been  brought  in  his  way  by  his  doings  in 
prose.  And  yet  he  had  begun  to  write  verses  when  he 
was  very  young ; — at  Cambridge,  as  we  have  seen,  when  he 
contributed  more  to  the  fame  of  Timbuctoo  than  I  think 
even  Tennyson  has  done — and  in  his  early  years  at  Paris. 
Here  again,  though  he  must  have  felt  the  strength  of  his 
own  mingled  humour  and  pathos,  he  always  struck  with  an 
uncertain  note  till  he  had  gathered  strength  and  confi- 
dence by  popularity.  Good  as  they  generally  were,  his 
verses  were  accidents,  written  not  as  a  writer  writes  who 
claims  to  be  a  poet,  but  as  though  they  might  have  been 
the  relaxation  of  a  doctor  or  a  barrister. 

And  so  they  were.  When  Thackeray  first  settled  him- 
self in  London,  to  make  his  living  among  the  magazines 
and  newspapers,  I  do  not  imagine  that  he  counted  much 
on  his  poetic  powers.  He  describes  it  all  in  his  own  dia- 
logue between  the  pen  and  the  album. 

"  Since  he,"  says  the  pen,  speaking  of  its  master, 
Thackeray : 

"  Since  he  my  faithful  service  did  engage, 
To  follow  him  through  his  queer  pilgrimage, 
I've  drawn  and  wi'itten  many  a  line  and  page. 

"  Caricatures  I  scribbled  have,  and  rhymes. 
And  dinner^ards,  and  picture  pantomimes, 
And  many  little  children's  books  at  times. 


24  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

"  I've  writ  the  foolish  fancy  of  his  brain ; 
The  aimless  jest  that,  striking,  hath  caused  pain ; 
The  idle  word  that  he'd  wish  back  again. 

*'  I've  helped  him  to  pen  many  a  line  for  bread." 

It  was  thus  lie  thought  of  his  work.  There  had  been 
caricatures,  and  rhymes,  and  many  little  children's  books ; 
and  then  the  lines  written  for  his  bread,  which,  except  that 
they  were  written  for  Punchy  was  hardly  undertaken  with 
a  more  serious  purpose.  In  all  of  it  there  was  ample  se- 
riousness, had  he  known  it  himself.  What  a  tale  of  the 
restlessness,  of  the  ambition,  of  the  glory,  of  the  misfort- 
unes of  a  great  country  is  given  in  the  ballads  of  Peter 
the  French  drummer !  Of  that  brain  so  full  of  fancy  the 
pen  had  lightly  written  all  the  fancies.  He  did  not  know 
it  when  he  was  doing  so,  but  with  that  word  fancy  he 
has  described  exactly  the  gift  with  which  his  brain  was 
specially  endowed.  If  a  writer  be  accurate,  or  sonorous, 
or  witty,  or  simply  pathetic,  he  may,  I  think,  gauge  his 
own  powers.  He  may  do  so  after  experience  with  some- 
thing of  certainty.  But  fancy  is  a  gift  which  the  owner 
of  it  cannot  measure,  and  the  power  of  which,  when  he  is 
using  it,  he  cannot  himself  understand.  There  is  the  same 
lambent  flame  flickering  over  everything  he  did,  even  the 
dinner  -  cards  and  the  picture  pantomimes.  He  did  not 
in  the  least  know  what  he  put  into  those  things.  So  it 
was  with  his  verses.  It  was  only  by  degrees,  when  he  was 
told  of  it  by  others,  that  he  found  that  they  too  were  of 
infinite  value  to  him  in  his  profession. 

The  Irish  Sketch  Book  came  out  in  1843,  in  which  he 
used,  but  only  half  used,  the  name  of  Michael  Angelo  Tit- 
marsh.  He  dedicates  it  to  Charles  Lever,  and  in  signing 
the  dedication  gave  his  own  name.     "  Laying  aside,"  he 


i.j  BIOGRAPHICAL.  25 

says,  "  for  a  moment  the  travelling  title  of  Mr.  Titmarsh, 
let  me  acknowledge  these  favours  in  my  own  name,  and 
subscribe  myself,  &c.,  &c.,  W.  M.  Thackeray."  So  he  grad- 
ually fell  into  the  declaration  of  his  own  identity.  In 
1844  he  made  his  journey  to  Turkey  and  Egypt — From 
Cornhill  to  Grand  Cairo,  as  he  called  it,  still  using  the  old 
nom  de  illume,  but  again  signing  the  dedication  with  his 
own  name.  It  was  now  made  to  the  captain  of  the  vessel 
in  which  he  encountered  that  famous  white  squall,  in  de- 
scribing which  he  has  shown  the  wonderful  power  he  had 
over  words. 

In  1846  was  commenced,  in  numbers,  the  novel  which 
first  made  his  name  well  knowm  to  the  world.  This  was 
Vanity  Fair,  a  work  to  which  it  is  evident  that  he  de- 
voted all  his  mind.  Up  to  this  time  his  writings  had 
consisted  of  short  contributions,  chiefly  of  sketches,  each 
intended  to  stand  by  itself  in  the  periodical  to  w^hich  it 
was  sent.  Barry  Lyndon  had  hitherto  been  the  longest ; 
but  that  and  Catherine  Hays,  and  the  Iloggarty  Diamond, 
though  stories  continued  through  various  numbers,  had 
not  as  yet  reached  the  dignity — or  at  any  rate  the  length 
— of  a  three-volume  novel.  But  of  late  novels  had  grown 
to  be  much  longer  than  those  of  the  old  well-known 
measure.  Dickens  had  stretched  his  to  nearly  double  the 
length,  and  had  published  them  in  twenty  numbers.  The 
attempt  had  caught  the  public  taste,  and  had  been  pre-em- 
inently successful.  The  nature  of  the  tale  as  originated 
by  him  was  altogether  unlike  that  to  which  the  readers  of 
modern  novels  had  been  used.  No  plot,  with  an  arranged 
catastrophe  or  denoument,  was  necessary.  Some  untying 
of  the  various  knots  of  the  narrative  no  doubt  were  expe- 
dient, but  these  were  of  the  simplest  kind,  done  with  the 
view  of  giving  an  end  to  that  which  might  otherwise  be 


26  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

endless.  The  adventures  of  a  Pickwick  or  a  Nicklehy  re- 
quired very  little  of  a  plot,  and  this  mode  of  telling  a  sto- 
ry, which  might  be  continued  on  through  any  number  of 
pages,  as  long  as  the  characters  were  interesting,  met  with 
approval.  Thackeray,  who  had  never  depended  much  on 
his  plot  in  the  shorter  tales  which  he  had  hitherto  told, 
determined  to  adopt  the  same  form  in  his  first  great  work 
but  with  these  changes : — That  as  the  central  character 
with  Dickens  had  always  been  made  beautiful  with  unnat- 
ural virtue — for  who  was  ever  so  unselfish  as  Pickwick,  so 
maul}'-  and  modest  as  Nicholas,  or  so  good  a  boy  as  Oli- 
ver?— so  should  his  centre  of  interest  be  in  every  respect 
abnormally  bad. 

As  to  Thackeray's  reason  for  this — or  rather  as  to  that 
condition  of  mind  which  brouofht  about  this  result  —  I 
will  say  something  in  a  final  chapter,  in  which  I  will  en- 
deavor to  describe  the  nature  and  effect  of  his  work  gen- 
erally. Here  it  will  be  necessary  only  to  declare  that, 
such  was  the  choice  he  now  made  of  a  subject  in  his  fi'*st 
attempt  to  rise  out  of  a  world  of  small  literary  contribu- 
tions, into  the  more  assured  position  of  the  author  of  a 
work  of  importance.  Wc  are  aware  that  the  monthly 
nurses  of  periodical  literature  did  not  at  first  smile  on  the 
effort.  The  proprietors  of  magazines  did  not  see  their 
way  to  undertake  Vanity  Fair,  and  the  publishers  are  said 
to  have  generally  looked  shy  upon  it.  At  last  it  was 
brought  out  in  numbers — twenty-four  numbers  instead  of 
twenty,  as  with  those  by  Dickens  —  under  the  guardian 
hands  of  Messrs.  Bradbury  and  Evans.  This  was  com- 
pleted in  1848,  and  then  it  was  that,  at  the  age  of  thirty- 
seven,  Thackeray  first  achieved  for  himself  a  name  and 
reputation  through  the  country.  Before  this  he  had  been 
known   at  Fraser'^s  and  at  the  Punch  office.      He  was 


I.]  BIOGRAPHICAL.  21 

known  at  the  Garrick  Club,  and  had  become  individually 
popular  among  literary  men  in  London.  He  had  made 
many  fast  friends,  and  had  been,  as  it  were,  found  out  by 
persons  of  distinction.  But  Jones,  and  Smith,  and  Robin- 
son, in  Liverpool,  Manchester,  and  Birmingham,  did  not 
know  him  as  they  knew  Dickens,  Carlyle,  Tennyson,  and 
Macaulay — not  as  they  knew  Landseer,  or  Stansfeld,  or 
Turner;  not  as  they  knew  Macready,  Charles  Kean,  or 
Miss  Faucit.  In  that  year,  1848,  his  name  became  com- 
mon in  the  memoirs  of  the  time.  On  the  5th  of  June  I 
find  him  dining  with  Macready,  to  meet  Sir  J.  Wilson, 
Panizzi,  Landseer,  and  others.  A  few  days  afterwards 
Macready  dined  with  him.  "  Dined  with.  Thackeray,  met 
the  Gordons,  Kenyons,  Procters,  Reeve,  Villiers,  Evans, 
Stansfeld,  and  saw  Mrs.  Sartoris  and  S.  C.  Dance,  White, 
H.  Goldsmid,  in  the  evening."  Again:  "Dined  with  For- 
ater,  having  called  and  taken  up  Brookfield,  met  Rintoul, 
Kenyon,  Procter,  Kinglake,  Alfred  Tennyson,  Thackeray." 
Macready  was  very  accurate  in  jotting  down  the  names  of 
those  he  entertained,  who  entertained  him,  or  were  en- 
tertained with  him.  Vanity  Fair  was  coming  out,  and 
Thackeray  had  become  one  of  the  personages  in  literary 
society.  In  the  January  number  of  1848  the  Edinburgh 
Mevieiu  had  an  article  on  Thackeray's  w'orks  generally  as 
they  were  then  known.  It  purports  to  combine  the  Irish 
Sketch  Book,  the  Journey  from  Cornhill  to  Grand  Cairo, 
and  Vanity  Fair  as  far  as  it  had  then  gone ;  but  it  does 
in  truth  deal  chiefly  with  the  literary  merits  of  the  latter. 
I  will  quote  a  passage  from  the  article,  as  proving  in  re- 
gard to  Thackeray's  work  an  opinion  which  was  well 
founded,  and  as  telling  the  story  of  his  life  as  far  as  it 
was  then  known  : 

"Full  many  a  valuable  truth,"  says  the  reviewer,  "has 
C 


28  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

been  sent  undulating  through  the  air  by  men  who  have 
lived  and  died  unknown.  At  this  moment  the  rising 
generation  are  supplied  with  the  best  of  their  mental 
aliment  by  writers  whose  names  are  a  dead  letter  to  the 
mass ;  and  among  the  most  remarkable  of  these  is  Michael 
Angelo  Titmarsh,  alias  William  Makepeace  Thackeray, 
author  of  the  Irish  Sketch  Book,  of  A  Journey  from 
Cornhill  to  Grand  Cairo,  of  Jeames's  Diary,  of  The  Snob 
Papers  in  Punch,  of  Vanity  Fair,  &c.,  (fee. 

"Mr.  Thackeray  is  now  about  thirty -seven  y^ars  of 
age,  of  a  good  family,  and  originally  intended  for  the  bar. 
He  kept  sevgn  or  eight  terms  at  Cambridge,  but  left  the 
university  without  taking  a  degree,  with  the  view  of  be- 
coming an  artist ;  and  we  well  remember,  ten  or  twelve 
years  ago,  finding  him  day  after  day  engaged  in  copying 
pictures  in  the  Louvre,  in  order  to  qualify  himself  for 
his  intended  profession.  It  may  be  doubted,  however, 
whether  any  degree  of  assiduity  would  have  enabled  him 
to  excel  in  the  money-making  branches,  for  his  talent  was 
altogether  of  the  Hogarth  kind,  and  was  principally 
remarkable  in  the  pen-and-ink  sketches  of  character  and 
situation,  which  he  dashed  off  for  the  amusement  of  his 
friends.  At  the  end  of  two  or  three  years  of  desultory 
application  he  gave  up  the  notion  of  becoming  a  painter, 
and  took  to  literature.  He  set  up  and  edited  with  marked 
ability  a  weekly  journal,  on  the  plan  of  The  Athenceum 
and  Literary  Gazette,  but  was  unable  to  compete  success- 
fully with  such  long-established  rivals.  He  then  became 
a  regular  man  of  letters — that  is,  he  wrote  for  respectable 
magfizines  and  newspapers,  until  the  attention  attracted  to 
his  contributions  in  Frase/s  Magazine  and  Punch  em- 
boldened him  to  start  on  his  own  account,  and  risk  an 
independent  publication."     Then  follows  a  eulogistic  and^ 


1.]  BIOGRAPHICAL.  29 

as  I  think,  a  correct  criticism  on  the  book  as  far  as  it  had 
gone.  There  are  a  few  remarks  perhaps  a  little  less 
eulogistic  as  to  some  of  his  minor  writings,  The  Snob 
Papers  in  particular ;  and  at  the  end  there  is  a  statement 
with  which  I  think  we  shall  all  now  agree:  "A  writer 
with  such  a  pen  and  pencil  as  Mr.  Thackeray's  is  an 
acquisition  of  real  and  high  value  in  our  literature." 

The  reviewer  has  done  his  work  in  a  tone  friendly  to 
the  author,  whom  he  knew^  —  as  indeed  it  may  be  said 
that  this  little  book  will  be  written  with  the  same  feeling 
— but  the  public  has  already  recognised  the  truth  of  the 
review  generally.  There  can  be  no  doubt  thajt  Thackeray, 
though  he  had  hitherto  been  but  a  contributor  of  anony- 
mous pieces  to  periodicals — to  what  is  generally  consid- 
ered as  merely  the  ephemeral  literature  of  the  month — 
had  already  become  effective  on  the  tastes  and  morals  of 
readers.  Affectation  of  finery ;  the  vulgarity  which  apes 
good  breeding  but  never  approaches  it;  dishonest  gam- 
bling, whether  with  dice  or  with  railway  shares;  and  that 
low  taste  for  literary  excitement  which  is  gratified  by 
mysterious  murders  and  Old  Bailey  executions,  had  already 
received  condign  punishment  from  Yellowplush,  Titmarsh, 
Fitzboodle,  and  Ikey  Solomon.  Under  all  those  names 
Thackeray  had  plied  his  trade  as  a  satirist.  Though  the 
truths,  as  the  reviewer  said,  had  been  merely  sent  undulat- 
ing through  the  air,  they  had  already  become  effective. 

Thackeray  had  now  become  a  personage  —  one  of  the 
recognised  stars  of  the  literary  heaven  of  the  day.  It 
was  an  honour  to  know  him ;  and  we  may  well  believe 
that  the  givers  of  dinners  were  proud  to  have  him  among 

*  The  article  was  written  by  Abraham  Hayward,  who  is  still  with 
us,  and  was  no  doubt  instigated  by  a  desire  to  assist  Thackeray  in 
his  struggle  upwards,  in  which  it  succeeded. 


30  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

their  giiests.  He  had  opened  his  oyster  with  his  pen — 
an  achievement  which  he  cannot  be  said  to  have  accom- 
plished until  Vanity  Fair  had  come  out.  In  inquiring 
about  him  from  those  who  survive  him,  and  knew  him 
well  in  those  days,  I  always  hear  the  same  account.  "  If 
I  could  only  tell  you  the  impromptu  lines  which  fell  from 
him !"  "  If  I  had  only  kept  the  drawings  from  his  pen, 
which  used  to  be  chucked  about  as  though  they  were 
worth  nothing !"  "  If  I  could  only  remember  the  droll- 
eries !"  Had  they  been  kept,  there  might  now  be  many 
volumes  of  these  sketches,  as  to  which  the  reviewer  says 
that  their  talent  was  "altogether  of  the  Hogarth  kind." 
Could  there  be  any  kind  more  valuable?  Like  Hogarth, 
he  could  always  make  his  picture  tell  his  story ;  though, 
unlike  Hogarth,  he  had  not  learned  to  draw.  I  have  had 
sent  to  me  for  my  inspection  an  album  of  drawings  and 
letters,  which,  in  the  course  of  twenty  years,  from  1829  to 
1849,  were  despatched  from  Thackeray  to  his  old  friend 
Edward  Fitzgerald.  Looking  at  the  wit  displayed  in  the 
drawings,  I  feel  inclined  to  say  that  had  he  persisted  he 
would  have  been  a  second  Hoo-arth.  There  is  a  series 
of  ballet  scenes,  in  which  "Flore  et  Zephyr"  are  the  two 
chief  performers,  which  for  expression  and  drollery  exceed 
anything  that  I  know  of  the  kind.  The  set  in  this  book 
are  lithographs,  which  were  published,  but  I  do"  not  re- 
member to  have  seen  them  elsewjiere.  There  are  still 
among  us  many  who  knew  him  well — Edward  Fitzgerald 
and  George  Yenables,  James  Spedding  and  Kinglake,  Mrs. 
Procter — the  widow  of  Barry  Cornwall,  who  loved  him 
well  —  and  Monckton  Milnes,  as  he  used  to  be,  whose 
touching  lines  written  just  after  Thackeray's  death  will 
close  this  volume,  Frederick  Pollock  and  Frank  Fladgatc, 
John  Blackwood  and  William  Russell — and  they  all  tell 


I.]  BIOGRAPHICAL.  31 

the  same  story.  Thongli  he  so  rarely  talked,  as  good 
talkers  do,  and  was  averse  to  sit  down  to  w^ork,  there  were 
always  falling  from  his  mouth  and  pen  those  little  pearls. 
Among  the  friends  who  had  been  kindest  and  dearest  to 
him  in  the  days  of  his  stragglings  he  once  mentioned 
three  to  me — Matthew  Higgins,  or  Jacob  Omnium,  as  he 
was  more  popularly  called ;  William  Stirling,  who  became 
Sir  William  Maxwell ;  and  Russell  Sturgis,  who  is  now  the 
senior  partner  in  the  great  house  of  Barings.  Alas,  only 
the  last  of  these  three  is  left  among  us !  Thackeray  was 
a  man  of  no  great  power  of  conversation.  I  doubt 
whether  he  ever  shone  in  what  is  called  general  society. 
He  was  not  a  man  to  be  valuable  at  a  dinner-table  as  a 
good  talker.  It  was  when  there  were  but  two  or  three  to- 
gether that  he  was  happy  himself  and  made  others  happy ; 
and  then  it  would  rather  be  from  some  special  piece  of 
drollery  that  the  joy  of  the  moment  would  come,  than 
from  the  discussion  of  ordinary  topics.  After  so  many 
years  his  old  friends  remember  the  fag-ends  of  the  dog- 
gerel lines  which  used  to  drop  from  him  without  any 
effort  on  all  occasions  of  jollity.  And  though  he  could 
be  very  sad  —  laden  with  melancholy,  as  I  think  must 
have  been  the  case  with  him  always — the  feeling  of  fun 
would  quickly  come  to  him,  and  the  queer  rhymes  would 
be  poured  out  as  plentifully  as  the  sketches  were  made. 
Here  is  a  contribution  which  I  find  hanging  in  the  mem- 
ory of  an  old  friend,  the  serious  nature  of  whose  literary 
labours  would  certainly  have  driven  such  lines  from  his 
mind,  had  they  not  at  the  time  caught  fast  hold  of  him : 

"In  the  romantic  little  town  of  Highbury 
My  father  kept  a  circulatin'  library ; 
He  followed  in  his  youth  that  man  immortal,  who 
Conquered  the  Frenchmen  on  the  plains  of  Waterloo. 


32  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

Mamma  was  an  inhabitant  of  Drogheda, 
Very  good  she  was  to  darn  and  to  embroider. 
In  the  famous  island  of  Jamaica, 
For  thirty  years  I've  been  a  sugar-baker ; 
And  here  I  sit,  the  Muses'  'appy  vot'ry, 
A  cultivatiu'  every  kind  of  po'try." 

There  may,  perhaps,  have  been  a  mistake  in  a  line,  but 
the  poem  has  been  handed  down  with  fair  correctness  over 
a  period  of  forty  years.  He  was  always  versifying.  He 
once  owed  me  five  pounds  seventeen  shillings  and  six- 
pence, his  share  of  a  dinner  bill  at  Richmond.  He  sent 
me  a  cheque  for  the  amount  in  rhyme,  giving  the  proper 
financial  document  on  the  second  half  of  a  sheet  of  note- 
paper.  I  gave  the  poem  away  as  an  autograph,  and  now 
forget  the  lines.  This  was  all  trifling,  the  reader  will  say. 
No  doubt.  Thackeray  was  always  trifling,  and  yet  always 
serious.  In  attempting  to  understand  his  character  it  is 
necessary  for  you  to  bear  within  your  own  mind  the  idea 
that  he  was  always,  within  his  own  bosom,  encountering 
melancholy  with  buffoonery,  and  meanness  with  satire. 
The  very  spirit  of  burlesque  dwelt  within  him — a  spirit 
which  does  not  see  the  grand  the  less  because  of  the  trav- 
esties which  it  is  always  engendering. 

In  his  youthful  —  all  but  boyish — days  in  London,  he 
delighted  to  "  put  himself  up  "  at  the  Bedford,  in  Covent 
Garden.  Then,  in  his  early  married  days,  he  lived  in  Al- 
bion Street,  and  from  thence  went  to  Great  Coram  Street, 
till  his  household  there  was  broken  up  by  his  wife's  ilhiess. 
He  afterwards  took  lodgings  in  St.  James's  Chambers,  and 
then  a  house  in  Young  Street,  Kensington.  Here  he  lived 
from  1847,  when  he  was  achieving  his  great  triumph  with 
Vanity  Fair,  down  to  1853,  when  he  removed  to  a  house 
which   he  bought  in  Onslow   Square.     In  Young  Street 


1.]  BIOGRAPHICAL.  33 

there  had  come  to  lodge  opposite  to  him  an  Irish  gentle- 
man, who,  on  the  part  of  his  injured  country,  felt  very- 
angry  with  Thackeray.  The  Irish  Sketch  Book  had  not 
been  complimentary,  nor  were  the  descriptions  which 
Thackeray  had  given  generally  of  Irishmen ;  and  there 
was  extant  an  absurd  idea  that  in  his  abominable  heroine 
Catherine  Hayes  he  had  alluded  to  Miss  Catherine  Hayes, 
the  Irish  singer.  Word  was  taken  to  Thackeray  that  this 
Irishman  intended  to  come  across  the  street  and  avenge 
his  country  on  the  calumniator's  person.  Thackeray  im- 
mediately called  upon  the  gentleman,  and  it  is  said  that 
the  visit  was  pleasant  to  both  parties.  There  certainly 
was  no  blood  shed. 

He  had  now  succeeded — in  1848 — in  makino*  for  him- 
self  a  standing  as  a  man  of  letters,  and  an  income.  What 
was  the  extent  of  his  income  I  have  no  means  of  saying ; 
nor  is  it  a  subject  on  which,  as  I  think,  inquiry  should  be 
made.  But  he  was  not  satisfied  with  his  position.  He 
felt  it  to  be  precarious,  and  he  was  always  thinking  of 
what  he  owed  to  his  two  girls.  That  arbitrium  pojyularis 
aur(B  on  which  he  depended  for  his  daily  bread  was  not 
regarded  by  him  with  the  confidence  which  it  deserved. 
He  did  not,  probably,  know  how  firm  was  the  hold  he  had 
obtained  of  the  public  ear.  At  any  rate  he  was  anxious, 
and  endeavoured  to  secure  for  himself  a  permanent  income 
in  the  public  service.  He  had  become  by  this  time  ac- 
quainted, probably  intimate,  with  the  Marquis  of  Clanri- 
carde,  who  was  then  Postmaster-General.  In  1848  there 
fell  a  vacancy  in  the  situation  of  Assistant-Secretary  at  the 
General  Post-Ofiice,  and  Lord  Clanricarde  either  offered  it 
to  him  or  promised  to  give  it  to  him.  The  Postmaster- 
General  had  the  disposal  of  the  place,  but  was  not  alto- 
gether free  from  control  in  the  matter.     When  he  made 


34  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

known  Ins  purpose  at  the  Post-Office,  lie  was  met  by  an 
assurance  from  the  ofBcer  next  under  him  that  the  thing 
could  not  be  done.  The  services  were  w^anted  of  a  man 
who  had  had  experience  in  the  Post-OfBce ;  and,  more- 
over, it  was  necessary  that  the  feelings  of  other  gentlemen 
should  be  consulted.  Men  who  have  been  serving:  in  an 
office  many  years  do  not  like  to  see  even  a  man  of  genius 
put  over  their  heads.  In  fact,  the  office  would  have  been 
up  in  arms  at  such  an  injustice.  Lord  Clanricarde,  who 
in  a  matter  of  patronage  w^as  not  scrupulous,  was  still  a 
good-natured  man  and  amenable.  He  attempted  to  be- 
fiicnd  his  friend  till  he  found  that  it  was  impossible,  and 
then,  with  the  best  grace  in  the  world,  accepted  the  official 
nominee  that  was  offered  to  him. 

It  may  be  said  that  had  Thackeray  succeeded  in  that 
attempt  he  would  surely  have  ruined  himself.  No  man 
can  be  fit  for  the  management  and  performance  of  special 
work  who  has  learned  nothing  of  it  before  his  thirty - 
seventh  year;  and  no  man  could  have  been  less  so  than 
Thackeray.  There  are  men  who,  though  they  be  not  fit, 
are  disposed  to  learn  their  lesson  and  make  themselves  as 
fit  as  possible.  Such  cannot  be  said  to  have  been  the  case 
with  this  man.  For  the  special  duties  which  he  would 
have  been  called  upon  to  perform,  consisting  to  a  great 
extent  of  the  maintenance  of  discipline  over  a  large  body 
of  men,  training  is  required,  and  the  service  would  have 
suffered  for  awhile  under  any  untried  elderly  tiro.  An- 
other man  might  have  put  himself  into  harness.  Thack- 
eray never  would  have  done  so.  The  details  of  his  work 
after  the  first  month  would  have  been  inexpressibly  weari- 
some to  him.  To  have  gone  into  the  city,  and  to  have  re- 
mained there  every  day  from  eleven  till  five,  would  have 
been  all  but  impossible  to  him.     lie  would  not  have  done 


1.J  BIOGRAPHICAL.  35 

it.  And  then  he  would  have  been  tormented  by  the  feel- 
ing that  he  was  taking  the  pay  and  not  doing  the  work. 
There  is  a  belief  current,  not  confined  to  a  few,  that  a  man 
may  be  a  Government  Secretary  with  a  generous  salary, 
and  have  nothing  to  do.  The  idea  is  something  that  re- 
mains to  us  from  the  old  days  of  sinecures.  If  there  be 
now  remaining  places  so  pleasant,  or  gentlemen  so  happy, 
I  do  not  know  them.  Thackeray's  notion  of  his  future 
duties  was  probably  very  vague.  He  would  have  repudi- 
ated the  notion  that  he  was  looking  for  a  sinecure,  but  no 
doubt  considered  that  the  duties  would  be  easy  and  light. 
It  is  not  too  much  to  assert,  that  he  who  could  drop  his 
pearls  as  I  have  said  above,  throwing  them  wide  cast  with- 
out an  effort,  would  have  found  his  work  as  Assistant- 
Secretary  at  the  General  Post-Office  to  be  altogether  too 
much  for  him.  And  then  it  was  no  doubt  his  intention 
to  join  literature  with  the  Civil  Service.  He  had  been 
taught  to  regard  the  Civil  Service  as  easy,  and  had  count- 
ed upon  himself  as  able  to  add  it  to  his  novels,  and  his 
work  with  his  Punch  brethren,  and  to  his  contributions 
generally  to  the  literature  of  the  day.  He  might  have 
done  so,  could  he  have  risen  at  five,  and  have  sat  at  his 
private  desk  for  three  hours  before  he  began  his  official 
routine  at  the  public  one.  A  capability  for  grinding,  an 
aptitude  for  continuous  task  work,  a  disposition  to  sit  in 
one's  chair  as  though  fixed  to  it  by  cobbler's  wax,  will  en- 
able a  man  in  the  prime  of  life  to  go  through  the  tedium 
of  a  second  day's  work  every  day ;  but  of  all  men  Thack- 
eray was  the  last  to  bear  the  wearisome  perseverance  of 
such  a  life.  Some  more  or  less  continuous  attendance  at 
his  oflBce  he  must  have  given,  and  with  it  would  have  gone 
Punch  and  the  novels,  the  ballads,  the  burlesques,  the  es- 
says, the  lectures,  and  the  monthly  papers  full  of  mingled 


36  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

satire  and  tenderness,  which  have  left  to  us  that  Thack- 
eray which  we  could  so  ill  aSord  to  lose  out  of  the  liter- 
ature of  the  nineteenth  century.  And  there  would  have 
remained  to  the  Civil  Service  the  memory  of  a  disgraceful 
job. 

He  did  not,  however,  give  up  the  idea  of  the  Civil  Ser- 
vice. In  a  letter  to  his  American  friend,  Mr.  Reed,  dated 
8th  November,  1854,  he  says:  "The  secretaryship  of  our 
Legation  at  Washington  was  vacant  the  other  day,  and  I 
instantly  asked  for  it ;  but  in  the  very  kindest  letter  Lord 
Clarendon  showed  how  the  petition  was  impossible.  First, 
the  place  was  given  away.  Next,  it  would  not  be  fair  to 
appoint  out  of  the  service.  But  the  first  was  an  excellent 
reason  —  not  a  doubt  of  it."  The  validity  of  the  second 
was  probably  not  so  apparent  to  him  as  it  is  to  one  who 
has  himself  waited  long  for  promotion.  "  So  if  ever  I 
come,"  he  continues,  "  as  I  hope  and  trust  to  do  this  time 
next  year,  it  must  be  in  my  own  coat,  and  not  the  Queen's." 
Certainly  in  his  own  coat,  and  not  in  the  Queen's,  must 
Thackeray  do  anything  by  which  he  could  mend  his  for- 
tune or  make  his  reputation.  There  never  was  a  man  less 
fit  for  the  Queen's  coat. 

Nevertheless  he  held  strong  ideas  that  much  was  due  by 
the  Queen's  ministers  to  men  of  letters,  and  no  doubt  had 
his  feelings  of  slighted  merit,  because  no  part  of  the  debt 
due  was  paid  to  him.  In  1850  he  wrote  a  letter  to  The 
Morning  Chronicle,  which  has  since  been  republished,  in 
which  he  alludes  to  certain  opinions  which  had  been  put 
forth  in  The  Examiner.  "  I  don't  see,"  he  says,  "  why 
men  of  letters  should  not  very  cheerfully  coincide  with 
Mr.  Examiner  in  accepting  all  the  honours,  places,  and 
prizes  which  they  can  get.  The  amount  of  such  as  will 
be  awarded  to  them  will  not,  we  may  be  pretty  sure,  im- 


I.]  BIOGRAPHICAL.  37 

povcrish  the  country  much ;  and  if  it  is  the  custom  of  the 
State  to  reward  by  money,  or  titles  of  honour,  or  stars  and 
garters  of  any  sort,  individuals  who  do  the  country  service 
— and  if  individuals  are  gratified  at  having  *Sir'  or  'My 
lord '  appended  to  their  names,  or  stars  and  ribbons  hooked 
on  to  their  coats  and  waistcoats,  as  men  most  undoubtedly 
are,  and  as  their  wives,  families,  and  relations  are — there 
can  be  no  reason  why  men  of  letters  should  not  have  the 
chance,  as  well  as  men  of  the  robe  or  the  sword  ;  or  why, 
if  honour  and  money  are  good  for  one  profession,  they 
should  not  be  good  for  another.  No  man  in  other  call- 
ings thinks  himself  degraded  by  receiving  a  reward  from 
his  Government;  nor,  surely,  need  the  literary  man  be 
more  squeamish  about  pensions,  and  ribbons,  and  titles, 
than  the  ambassador,  or  general,  or  judge.  Every  Eu- 
ropean state  but  ours  rewards  its  men  of  letters.  The 
American  Government  gives  them  their  full  share  of  its 
small  patronage ;  and  if  Americans,  why  not  Englishmen  ?" 
In  this  a  great  subject  is  discussed  which  would  be  too 
long  for  these  pages ;  but  I  think  that  there  now  exists  a 
feeling  that  literature  can  herself,  for  herself,  produce  a 
rank  as  effective  as  any  that  a  Queen's  minister  can  be- 
stow. Surely  it  would  be  a  repainting  of  the  lily,  an  add- 
ing a  flavour  to  the  rose,  a  gilding  of  refined  gold  to  create 
to-morrow  a  Lord  Viscount  Tennyson,  a  Baron  Carlyle,  or 
a  Right  Honourable  Sir  Robert  Browning.  And  as  for  pay 
and  pension,  the  less  the  better  of  it  for  any  profession, 
unless  so  far  as  it  may  be  payment  made  for  work  done. 
Then  the  higher  the  payment  the  better,  in  literature  as 
in  all  other  trades.  It  may  be  doubted  even  whether  a 
special  rank  of  its  own  be  good  for  literature,  such  as  that 
which  is  achieved  by  the  happy  possessors  of  the  forty 
chairs  of  the  Academy  in  France.     Even  though  they  had 


38  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

an  angel  to  make  the  choice — which  they  have  not — that 
angel  would  do  more  harm  to  the  excluded  than  good  to 
the  selected. 

Pendenriis,  Esmond,  and  The  Newcomes  followed  Vani- 
ty Fair — not  very  quickly  indeed,  always  at  an  interval  of 
two  years  —  in  1850,  1852,  and  1854.  As  I  purpose  to 
devote  a  separate  short  chapter,  or  part  of  a  chapter,  to 
each  of  these,  I  need  say  nothing  here  of  their  special 
merits  or  demerits.  Esmond  was  brought  out  as  a  whole. 
The  others  appeared  in  numbers.  "  He  lisped  in  numbers, 
for  the  numbers  came."  It  is  a  mode  of  pronunciation  in 
literature  by  no  means  very  articulate,  but  easy  of  produc- 
tion and  lucrative.  But  though  easy  it  is  seductive,  and 
leads  to  idleness.  An  author  by  means  of  it  can  raise 
money  and  reputation  on  his  book  before  he  has  written 
it,  and  when  the  pang  of  parturition  is  over  in  regard  to 
one  part,  he  feels  himself  entitled  to  a  period  of  ease  be- 
cause the  amount  required  for  the  next  division  will  occu- 
py him  only  half  the  month.  This  to  Thackeray  was  so 
alluring  that  the  entirety  of  the  final  half  was  not  always 
given  to  the  task.  His  self-reproaches  and  bemoanings 
when  sometimes  the  day  for  reappearing  would  come  ter- 
ribly nigh,  while  yet  the  necessary  amount  of  copy  was 
far  from  being  ready,  were  often  very  ludicrous  and  very 
sad — ludicrous  because  he  never  told  of  his  distress  with- 
out adding  to  it  something  of  ridicule  which  was  irre- 
sistible, and  sad  because  those  who  loved  him  best  were 
aware  that  physical  suffering  had  already  fallen  upon  him, 
and  that  he  was  deterred  by  illness  from  the  exercise  of 
continuous  energy.  I  myself  did  not  know  him  till  after 
the  time  now  in  question.  My  acquaintance  with  him 
was  quite  late  in  his  life.  But  he  has  told  me  something 
of  it,  and  I  have  heard  from  those  who  lived  with  him 


I.]  BIOGRAPHICAL.  39 

how  continua]  were  his  sufferings.  In  1854,  he  says  in 
one  of  his  letters  to  Mr.  Reed  —  the  only  private  letters 
of  his  which  I  know  to  have  been  published:  "I  am 
to-day  just  out  of  bed  after  another,  about  the  dozenth, 
severe  fit  of  spasms  which  I  have  had  this  year.  My  book 
would  have  been  written  but  for  them."  His  work  was 
always  going  on,  but  though  not  fuller  of  matter — that 
would  have  been  almost  impossible  —  would  have  been 
better  in  manner  had  he  been  delayed  neither  by  suffer- 
ing nor  by  that  palsying  of  the  energies  which  suffering 
produces. 

This  ought  to  have  been  the  happiest  period  of  his  life, 
and  should  have  been  very  happy.  He  had  become  fairly 
easy  in  his  circumstances.  He  had  succeeded  in  his  work, 
and  had  made  for  himself  a  great  name.  He  was  fond  of 
popularity,  and  especially  anxious  to  be  loved  by  a  small 
circle  of  friends.  These  good  things  he  had  thoroughly 
achieved.  Immediately  after  the  publication  of  Vanity 
Fair  he  stood  high  among  the  literary  heroes  of  his  coun- 
try, and  had  endeared  himself  especially  to  a  special  knot 
of  friends.  His  face  and  figure,  his  six  feet  four  in  height, 
with  his  flowing  hair,  already  nearly  gray,  and  his  broken 
nose,  his  broad  forehead  and  ample  chest,  encountered 
everywhere  either  love  or  respect ;  and  his  daughters  to 
him  were  all  the  world — the  bairns  of  whom  he  says,  at 
the  end  of  the  White  Squall  ballad : 

"  I  thought,  as  day  was  breaking, 
My  little  girls  were  waking, 
And  smiling,  and  making 
A  prayer  at  home  for  me." 

Nothino;  could  have  been  more  tender  or  endearins:  than 
his  relations  with  his   children.      But  still  there  was  a 


40  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

skeleton  in  his  cupboard — or  rather  two  skeletons.  His 
home  had  been  broken  up  by  his  wife's  malady,  and  his 
own  health  was  shattered.  When  he  was  writing  Pen- 
dermis,  in  1849,  he  had  a  severe  fever,  and  then  those 
spasms  came,  of  which  four  or  five  years  afterwards  he 
wrote  to  Mr.  Reed.  His  home,  as  a  home  should  be,  was 
never  restored  to  him — or  his  health.  Just  at  that  period 
of  life  at  which  a  man  generally  makes  a  happy  exchange 
in  taking  his  wife's  drawing-room  in  lieu  of  the  smoking- 
room  of  his  club,  and  assumes  those  domestic  ways  of 
living  which  are  becoming  and  pleasant  for  matured  years, 
that  drawing-room  and  those  domestic  ways  were  closed 
against  him.  The  children  were  then  no  more  than  ba- 
bies, as  far  as  society  was  concerned — things  to  kiss  and 
play  with,  and  make  a  home  happy  if  they  could  only 
have  had  their  mother  with  them.  I  have  no  doubt  there 
were  those  who  thought  that  Thackeray  was  very  jolly 
under  his  adversity.  Jolly  he  was.  It  was  the  manner 
of  the  man  to  be  so — if  that  continual  playfulness  which 
was  natural  to  him,  lying  over  a  melancholy  which  was  as 
continual,  be  compatible  with  jollity.  He  laughed,  and 
ate,  and  drank,  and  threw  his  pearls  about  with  miraculous 
profusion.  But  I  fancy  that  he  was  far  from  happy.  I 
remember  once,  when  I  was  young,  receiving  advice  as  to 
the  manner  in  which  I  had  better  spend  my  evenings ;  I 
was  told  that  I  ought  to  go  home,  drink  tea,  and  read 
good  books.  It  was  excellent  advice,  but  I  found  that  the 
reading  of  good  books  in  solitude  was  not  an  occupation 
congenial  to  me.  It  was  so,  I  take  it,  with  Thackeray. 
He  did  not  like  his  lonely  drawing-room,  and  went  back 
to  his  life  among  the  clubs  by  no  means  with  content- 
ment. 

In  1853,  Thackeray  having  then  his  own  two  girls  to 


I.]  BIOGRAPHICAL.  41 

provide  for,  added  a  third  to  his  family,  and  adopted  Amy 
Crowe,  the  daugliter  of  an  old  friend,  and  sister  of  the 
well-known  artist  now  among  us.  How  it  came  to  pass 
that  she  wanted  a  home,  or  that  this  special  home  suited 
her,  it  would  be  unnecessary  here  to  tell  even  if  I  knew. 
But  that  he  did  give  a  home  to  this  young  lady,  making 
her  in  all  respects  the  same  as  another  daughter,  should 
be  told  of  him.  He  was  a  man  who  liked  to  broaden  his 
back  for  the  support  of  others,  and  to  make  himself  easy 
under  such  burdens.  In  1862,  she  married  a  Thackeray 
cousin,  a  young  officer  with  the  Victoria  Cross,  Edward 
Thackeray,  and  went  out  to  India,  where  she  died. 

In  1854,  the  year  in  which  The  Newcomes  came  out, 
Thackeray  had  broken  his  close  alliance  with  Punch.  In 
December  of  that  year  there  appeared  from  his  pen  an 
article  in  The  Quarterly  on  John  Leeches  Pictures  of  Life 
and  Character.  It  is  a  rambling  discourse  on  picture-illus- 
tration in  general,  full  of  interest,  but  hardly  good  as  a 
criticism  —  a  portion  of  literary  work  for  which  he  was 
not  specially  fitted.  In  it  he  tells  us  how  Richard  Doyle, 
the  artist,  had  given  up  his  work  for  Punch,  not  having 
been  able,  as  a  Roman  Catholic,  to  endure  the  skits  which, 
at  that  time,  were  appearing  in  one  number  after  another 
against  what  was  then  called  Papal  aggression.  The  re- 
viewer—  Thackeray  himself  —  then  tells  us  of  the  seces- 
sion of  himself  from  the  board  of  brethren.  "Another 
member  of  Mr.  Punch's  cabinet,  the  biographer  of  Jeames^ 
the  author  of  The  Snob  Papers,  resigned  his  functions,  on 
account  of  Mr.  Punch's  assaults  upon  the  present  Emperor 
of  the  French  nation,  whose  anger  Jeamcs  thought  it  was 
unpatriotic  to  arouse.'^  How  hard  it  must  be  for  Cabinets 
to  agree !  This  man  or  that  is  sure  to  have  some  pet  con- 
viction of  his  own,  and  the  better  the  man  the  stronger 

3 


42  THACKERAY.  [chat. 

the  conviction !  Then  the  reviewer  went  on  in  favour  of 
the  artist  of  whom  he  was  specially  speaking,  making  a 
comparison  which  must  at  the  time  have  been  odious 
enough  to  some  of  the  brethren.  "There  can  be  no 
blinking  the  fact  that  in  Mr.  Punch's  Cabinet  John  Leech 
is  the  right-hand  man.  Fancy  a  number  of  Punch  with- 
out Leech's  pictures!  What  would  you  give  for  it?" 
Then  he  breaks  out  into  strong  admiration  of  that  one 
friend — perhaps  with  a  little  disregard  as  to  the  feelings 
of  other  friends.*  This  Critical  Review,  if  it  may  prop- 
erly be  so  called — at  any  rate  it  is  so  named  as  now  pub- 
lished— is  to  be  found  in  our  author's  collected  works,  in 
the  same  volume  with  Catherine.  It  is  there  preceded  by 
another,  from  The  Westminster  Review,  written  fourteen 
years  earlier,  on  The  Genius  of  CruikshanJc.  This  con- 
tains a  descriptive  catalogue  of  Cruikshank's  works  up  to 
that  period,  and  is  interesting,  from  the  piquant  style  in 
which  it  is  written.  I  fancy  that  these  two  are  the  only 
efforts  of  the  kind  which  he  made — and  in  both  he  dealt 
with  the  two  great  caricaturists  of  his  time,  he  himself  be- 
ing, in  the  imaginative  part  of  a  caricaturist's  work,  equal 
in  power  to  either  of  them. 

We  now  come  to  a  phase  of  Thackeray's  life  in  which 
he  achieved  a  remarkable  success,  attributable  rather  to 
his  fame  as  a  writer  than  to  any  particular  excellence  in 
the  art  which  he  then  exercised.     lie  took  upon  himself 

^  For  a  week  there  existed  at  the  Punch  office  a  grudge  against 
Thackeray  in  reference  to  this  awkward  question :  "  What  would 
you  give  for  your  Punch  without  John  Leech  ?"  Then  he  asked  the 
confraternity  to  dinner — more  Thackerayano — and  the  confraternity 
came.  Who  can  doubt  but  they  were  very  jolly  over  the  little  blun- 
der? For  years  afterwards  Thackeray  was  a  guest  at  the  well- 
known  Punch  dinner,  though  he  was  no  longer  one  of  the  contributors. 


I.]  BIOGRAPHICAL.  43 

the  functions  of  a  lecturer,  being  moved  to  do  so  by  a 
hope  tliat  he  might  thus  provide  a  sum  of  money  for  the 
future  sustenance  of  his  children.  No  doubt  he  had  been 
advised  to  this  course,  though  I  do  not  know  from  whom 
specially  the  advice  may  have  come.  Dickens  had  already 
considered  the  subject,  but  had  not  yet  consented  to  read 
in  public  for  money  on  his  own  account.  John  Forster, 
writing  of  the  year  1846,  says  of  Dickens  and  the  then 
only  thought-of  exercise  of  a  new  profession :  "  I  contin- 
ued to  oppose,  for  reasonP)  to  be  stated  in  their  place,  that 
which  he  had  set  his  heart  upon  too  strongly  to  abandon, 
and  which  I  still  can  wish  he  had  preferred  to  surrender 
with  all  that  seemed  to  be  its  enormous  gain."  And 
again  he  says,  speaking  of  a  proposition  which  had  been 
made  to  Dickens  from  the  to^\n  of  Bradford:  "At  first 
this  was  entertained,  but  was  abandoned,  with  some  reluc- 
tance, upon  the  argument  that  to  become  publicly  a  reader 
must  alter,  without  improving,  his  position  publicly  as  a 
writer,  and  that  it  was  a  change  to  be  justified  only  when 
the  higher  calling  should  have  failed  of  the  old  success." 
The  meaning  of  this  was  that  the  money  to  be  made 
would  be  sweet,  but  that  the  descent  to  a  profession 
which  was  considered  to  be  lower  than  that  of  literature 
itself  would  carry  with  it  something  that  was  bitter.  It 
was  as  thouo-h  one  who  had  sat  on  the  Woolsack  as  Lord 
Chancellor  should  raise  the  question  whether,  for  the  sake 
of  the  income  attached  to  it,  he  might,  without  disgrace, 
occupy  a  seat  on  a  lower  bench ;  as  though  an  architect 
should  consider  with  himself  the  propriety  of  making  his 
fortune  as  a  contractor ;  or  the  head  of  a  college  lower  his 
dignity,  while  he  increased  his  finances,  by  taking  pupils. 
When  such  discussions  arise,  money  generally  carries  the 

day  —  and  should  do  so.     When   convinced  that  money 
D 


44  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

may  be  earned  without  disgrace,  we  ought  to  allow  money 
to  carry  the  day.  When  we  talk  of  sordid  gain  and  filthy 
lucre,  we  are  generally  hypocrites.  If  gains  be  sordid 
and  lucre  filthy,  where  is  the  priest,  the  lawyer,  the  doc- 
tor, or  the  man  of  literature,  who  does  not  wish  for  dirty 
hands  ?  An  income,  and  the  power  of  putting  by  some- 
thing for  old  age,  something  for  those  who  are  to  come 
after,  is  the  wholesome  and  acknowledged  desire  of  all 
professional  men.  Thackeray  having  children,  and  being 
gifted  with  no  power  of  making  his  money  go  very  far, 
was  anxious  enough  on  the  subject.  We  may  say  now, 
that  had  he  confined  himself  to  his  pen,  he  would  not 
have  wanted  while  he  lived,  but  would  have  left  but  little 
behind  him.  That  he  was  anxious  we  have  seen,  by  his 
attempts  to  subsidise  his  literary  gains  by  a  Government 
oflSce.  I  cannot  but  think  that  had  he  undertaken  public 
duties  for  which  he  was  ill  qualified,  and  received  a  salary 
which  he  could  hardly  have  earned,  he  ^vould  have  done 
less  for  his  fame  than  by  reading  to  the  public.  Whether 
he  did  that  well  or  ill,  he  did  it  well  enough  for  the  mon- 
ey. The  people  who  heard  him,  and  who  paid  for  their 
seats,  were  satisfied  with  their  bargain — as  they  were  also 
in  the  case  of  Dickens ;  and  I  venture  to  say  that  in  be- 
coming publicly  a  reader,  neither  did  Dickens  or  Thack- 
eray "alter  his  position  as  a  writer,"  and  "that  it  was  a 
change  to  be  justified,"  though  the  success  of  the  old  call- 
ing had  in  no  degree  waned.  What  Thackeray  did  ena- 
bled him  to  leave  a  comfortable  income  for  his  children, 
and  one  earned  honestly,  with  the  full  approval  of  the 
world  around  him. 

Having  saturated  his  mind  with  the  literature  of  Queen 
Anne's  time — not  probably,  in  the  first  instance,  as  a  prep- 
aration for  Esmond,  but  in  such  a  way  as  to  induce  him 


I.]  BIOGRAPHICAL.  45 

to  create  an  Esmond — he  took  the  authors  whom  he  knew 
so  well  as  the  subject  for  his  first  series  of  lectures.  He 
wrote  The  English  Humourists  of  the  Eighteenth  Century 
in  1851,  while  he  must  have  been  at  work  on  Esmond, 
and  first  delivered  the  course  at  Willis's  Rooms  in  that 
year.  He  afterwards  went  with  these  through  many  of 
our  provincial  towns,  and  then  carried  them  to  the  United 
States,  where  he  delivered  them  to  large  audiences  in  the 
winter  of  1852  and  1853.  Some  few  words  as  to  the 
merits  of  the  composition  I  will  endeavour  to  say  in  an- 
other place.  I  myself  never  heard  him  lecture,  and  can 
therefore  give  no  opinion  of  the  performance.  That  which 
I  have  heard  from  others  has  been  very  various.  It  is,  I 
think,  certain  that  he  had  none  of  those  wonderful  gifts 
of  elocution  which  made  it  a  pleasure  to  listen  to  Dickens, 
whatever  he  read  or  w^hatever  he  said ;  nor  had  he  that 
powder  of  application  by  using  which  his  rival  taught  him- 
self with  accuracy  the  exact  effect  to  be  given  to  every 
word.  The  rendering  of  a  piece  by  Dickens  was  com- 
posed as  an  oratorio  is  composed,  and  was  then  studied 
by  heart  as  music  is  studied.  And  the  piece  was  all  giv- 
en by  memory,  without  any  looking  at  the  notes  or  words. 
There  w^as  nothing  of  this  with  Thackeray.  But  the 
thing  read  was  in  itself  of  great  interest  to  educated  peo- 
ple. The  words  were  given  clearly,  with  sufficient  into- 
nation for  easy  understanding,  so  that  they  who  were  will- 
ing to  hear  something  from  him  felt  on  hearing  that  they 
had  received  full  value  for  their  money.  At  any  rate,  the 
lectures  were  successful.  The  money  was  made — and  was 
kept. 

He  came  from  nis  first  trip  to  America  to  his  new  house 
in  Onslow  Square,  and  then  published  The  Newcomes. 
This,  too,  was  one  of  his  great  works,  as  to  which  I  shall 


46  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

have  to  speak  hereafter.  Then,  having  enjoyed  his  suc- 
cess in  the  first  attempt  to  lecture,  he  prepared  a  second 
series.  He  never  essayed  the  kind  of  reading  which  with 
Dickens  became  so  wonderfully  popular.  Dickens  recited 
portions  from  his  well-known  works.  Thackeray  wrote 
his  lectures  expressly  for  the  purpose.  They  have  since 
been  added  to  his  other  literature,  but  they  were  prepared 
as  lectures.  The  second  series  were  The  Four  Georges. 
In  a  lucrative  point  of  view  they  were  even  more  success- 
ful than  the  first,  the  sum  of  money  realised  in  the  United 
States  having  been  considerable.  In  England  they  were 
less  popular,  even  if  better  attended,  the  subject  chosen 
having  been  distasteful  to  many.  There  arose  the  ques- 
tion whether  too  much  freedom  had  not  been  taken  with 
an  office  which,  though  it  be  no  longer  considered  to  be 
founded  on  divine  right,  is  still  as  sacred  as  can  be  any- 
thing that  is  human.  If  there  is  to  remain  among  us  a 
sovereign,  that  sovereign,  even  though  divested  of  political 
power,  should  be  endowed  with  all  that  personal  respect 
can  give.  If  we  wish  ourselves  to  be  high,  we  should  treat 
that  which  is  over  us  as  high.  And  this  should  not  de- 
pend altogether  on  personal  character,  though  we  know 
— as  we  have  reason  to  know — how  much  may  be  added 
to  the  firmness  of  the  feeling  by  personal  merit.  The  re- 
spect of  which  we  speak  should,  in  the  strongest  degree, 
be  a  possession  of  the  immediate  occupant,  and  will  natu- 
rally become  dim — or  perhaps  be  exaggerated — in  regard 
to  the  past,  as  history  or  fable  may  tell  of  them.  No  one 
need  hesitate  to  speak  his  mind  of  King  John,  let  him 
be  ever  so  strong  a  stickler  for  the  privileges  of  majesty. 
But  there  are  degrees  of  distance,  and  the  throne  of  which 
we  wish  to  preserve  the  dignity  seems  to  be  assailed  when 
unmeasured  evil  is  said  of  one  who  has  sat  there  within 


I.]  BIOGRAPHICAL.  47 

our  own  memory.  There  would  seem  to  each  of  us  to  be 
a  personal  affront  were  a  departed  relative  delineated  with 
all  those  faults  by  which  we  must  own  that  even  our  near 
relatives  have  been  made  imperfect.  It  is  a  general  con- 
viction as  to  this  which  so  frequently  turns  the  biography 
of  those  recently  dead  into  mere  eulogy.  The  fictitious 
charity  which  is  enjoined  by  the  de  mortuis  nil  nisi  honum 
banishes  truth.  The  feeling  of  which  I  speak  almost  leads 
me  at  this  moment  to  put  down  my  pen.  And,  if  so  much 
be  due  to  all  subjects,  is  less  due  to  a  sovereign  ? 

Considerations  such  as  these  diminished,  I  think,  the 
popularity  of  Thackeray's  second  series  of  lectures;  or, 
rather,  not  their  popularity,  but  the  estimation  in  which 
they  were  held.  On  this  head  he  defended  himself  more 
than  once  very  gallantly,  and  had  a  great  deal  to  say  on 
his  side  of  the  question.  "  Suppose,  for  example,  in  Amer- 
ica— in  Philadelphia  or  in  New  York — that  I  had  spoken 
about  George  IV.  in  terms  of  praise  and  affected  rever- 
ence, do  you  believe  they  would  have  hailed  his  name  with 
cheers,  or  have  heard  it  with  anything  of  respect?"  And 
again:  "We  degrade  our  own  honour  and  the  sovereign's 
by  unduly  and  unjustly  praising  him  ;  and  the  mere  slav- 
erer and  flatterer  is  one  who  comes  forward,  as  it  were, 
with  flash  notes,  and  pays  with  false  coin  his  tribute  to 
Caesar.  I  don't  disguise  that  I  feel  somehow  on  my  trial 
here  for  loyalty — for  honest  English  feeling."  This  was 
said  by  Thackeray  at  a  dinner  at  Edinburgh,  in  1857,  and 
shows  how  the  matter  rested  on  his  mind.  Thackeray's 
loyalty  was  no  doubt  true  enough,  but  was  mixed  with 
but  little  of  reverence.  He  was  one  who  revered  modesty 
and  innocence  rather  than  power,  against  which  he  had  in 
the  bottom  of  his  heart  something  of  republican  tendency. 
His  leaning  was  no  doubt  of  the  more  manly  kind.     But 


48  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

in  what  he  said  at  Edinburgh  he  hardly  hit  the  nail  on 
the  head.  No  one  had  suggested  that  he  should  have  said 
good  things  of  a  king  which  he  did  not  believe  to  be  true. 
The  question  was  whether  it  may  not  be  well  sometimes 
for  us  to  hold  our  tongues.  An  American  literary  man, 
here  in  England,  would  not  lecture  on  the  morals  of  Ham- 
ilton, on  the  manners  of  General  Jackson,  on  the  general 
amenities  of  President  Johnson. 

In  1857  Thackeray  stood  for  Oxford,  in  the  Liberal  in- 
terest, in  opposition  to  Mr.  Cardwell.  He  had  been  in- 
duced to  do  this  by  his  old  friend  Charles  Neate,  who  him- 
self twice  sat  for  Oxford,  and  died  now  not  many  months 
since.  He  polled  1,017  votes,  against  1,070  by  Mr.  Card- 
well  ;  and  was  thus  again  saved  by  his  good  fortune  from 
attempting  to  fill  a  situation  in  which  he  would  not  have 
shone.  There  are,  no  doubt,  many  to  whom  a  seat  in  Par- 
liament comes  almost  as  the  birthright  of  a  well-born  and 
well-to-do  English  gentleman.  They  go  there  with  no 
more  idea  of  shining  than  they  do  when  they  are  elected 
to  a  first-class  club — hardly  with  more  idea  of  being  use- 
ful. It  is  the  thing  to  do,  and  the  House  of  Commons  is 
the  place  where  a  man  ought  to  be — for  a  certain  number 
of  hours.  Such  men  neither  succeed  nor  fail,  for  nothing 
is  expected  of  them.  From  such  a  one  as  Thackeray  some- 
thing would  have  been  expected,  which  would  not  have 
been  forthcoming.  He  was  too  desultory  for  regular  work 
— full  of  thought,  but  too  vague  for  practical  questions. 
He  could  not  have  endured  to  sit  for  two  or  three  hours  at 
a  time  with  his  hat  over  his  eyes,  pretending  to  listen,  as 
is  the  duty  of  a  good  legislator.  He  was  a  man  intolerant 
of  tedium,  and  in  the  best  of  his  time  impatient  of  slow 
work.  Nor,  though  his  liberal  feelings  were  very  strong, 
were  his  political  convictions  definite  or  accurate.    He  was 


I.]  BIOGRAPHICAL.  49 

a  man  wLo  mentally  drank  in  much,  feeding  his  fancy 
hourly  with  what  he  saw,  what  he  heard,  what  he  read, 
and  then  pouring  it  all  out  with  an  immense  power  of  am- 
plification. But  it  would  have  been  impossible  for  him  to 
study  and  bring  home  to  himself  the  various  points  of  a 
complicated  bill  with  a  hundred  and  fifty  clauses.  In  be- 
coming a  man  of  letters,  and  taking  that  branch  of  letters 
which  fell  to  him,  he  obtained  the  special  place  that  was 
fitted  for  him.  He  was  a  round  peg  in  a  round  hole. 
There  was  no  other  hole  which  he  would  have  fitted  near- 
ly so  well.  But  he  had  his  moment  of  political  ambition, 
like  others — and  paid  a  thousand  pounds  for  his  attempt. 
In  1857  the  first  number  of  The  Virginians  appeared; 
and  the  last — the  twenty-fourth — in  October,  1859.  This 
novel,  as  all  my  readers  are  aware,  is  a  continuance  of  Es- 
mond^ and  will  be  spoken  of  in  its  proper  place.  He  was 
then  forty-eight  years  old,  very  gray,  with  much  of  age 
upon  him,  which  had  come  from  suffering — age  shown  by 
dislike  of  activity  and  by  an  old  man's  way  of  thinking 
about  many  things — speaking  as  though  the  world  were 
all  behind  him  instead  of  before ;  but  still  with  a  stalwart 
outward  bearing,  very  erect  in  his  gait,  and  a  countenance 
peculiarly  expressive  and  capable  of  much  dignity.  I  speak 
of  his  personal  appearance  at  this  time,  because  it  was  then 
only  that  I  became  acquainted  with  him.  In  1859  he  un- 
dertook the  last  great  work  of  his  life,  the  editorship  of 
The  Cornhill  Magazine^  a  periodical  set  on  foot  by  Mr. 
George  Smith,  of  the  house  of  Smith  and  Elder,  with  an 
amount  of  energy  greater  than  has  generally  been  bestowed 
upon  such  enterprises.  It  will  be  well  remembered  still 
how  much  The  Cornhill  was  talked  about  and  thought  of 
before  it  first  appeared,  and  how  much  of  that  thinking 
and  talking  was  due  to  the  fact  that  Mr.  Thackeray  w\is  to 

3-^ 


50  THACKERAY.  [cHA^. 

edit  it.  Macmillanh,  I  think,  was  the  first  of  the  shilling 
magazines,  having  preceded  The  Cornhill  by  a  month,  and 
it  would  ill  become  me,  who  have  been  a  humble  servant 
to  each  of  them,  to  give  to  either  any  preference.  But  it 
must  be  acknowledged  that  a  great  deal  was  expected  from 
The  Cornhill^  and  I  think  it  will  be  confessed  that  it  was 
the  general  opinion  that  a  great  deal  was  given  by  it. 
Thackeray  had  become  big  enough  to  give  a  special  eclat 
to  any  literary  exploit  to  which  he  attached  himself.  Since 
the  days  of  The  Constitutional  he  had  fought  his  way  up 
the  ladder,  and  knew  how  to  take  his  stand  there  with  an 
assurance  of  success.  When  it  became  known  to  the 
world  of  readers  that  a  new  magazine  was  to  appear  under 
Thackeray's  editorship,  the  world  of  readers  was  quite  sure 
that  there  would  be  a  large  sale.  Of  the  first  number  over 
one  hundred  and  ten  thousand  were  sold,  and  of  the  sec- 
ond and  third  over  one  hundred  thousand.  It  is  in  the 
nature  of  such  things  that  the  sale  should  fall  off  when 
the  novelty  is  over.  People  believe  that  a  new  delight 
has  come,  a  new  joy  for  ever,  and  then  find  that  the  joy 
is  not  quite  so  perfect  or  enduring  as  they  had  expected. 
But  the  commencement  of  such  enterprises  may  be  taken 
as  a  measure  of  what  will  follow.  The  magazine,  either 
by  Thackeray's  name  or  by  its  intrinsic  merits  —  proba- 
bly by  both — achieved  a  great  success.  My  acquaintance 
with  him  grew  from  my  having  been  one  of  his  staff  from 
the  first. 

About  two  months  before  the  opening  day  I  wrote  to 
him  suggesting  that  he  should  accept  from  me  a  series  of 
four  short  stories  on  which  I  was  engaged.  I  got  back  a 
long  letter  in  which  he  said  nothing  about  my  short  sto- 
ries, but  asking  whether  I  could  go  to  work  at  once  and 
let  him  have  a  long  novel,  so  that  it  might  begin  with  the 


I.  J  BIOGRAPHICAL.  51 

first  number.  At  the  same  time  I  heard  from  the  pub- 
lisher, who  suggested  some  interesting  little  details  as  to 
honorarium.  The  little  details  were  very  interesting,  but 
absolutely  no  time  was  allowed  to  me.  It  was  required 
that  the  first  portion  of  my  book  should  be  in  the  printer's 
hands  within  a  month.  Now  it  was  my  theory — and  ever 
since  this  occurrence  has  been  my  practice  —  to  see  the 
end  of  my  own  work  before  the  public  should  see  the  com- 
mencement.^ If  I  did  this  thing  I  must  not  only  abandon 
my  theory,  but  instantly  contrive  a  story,  or  begin  to  write 
it  before  it  was  contrived.  That  was  what  I  did,  urged  by 
the  interestino*  nature  of  the  details.  A  novelist  cannot 
always  at  the  spur  of  the  moment  make  his  plot  and  cre- 
ate his  characters  who  shall,  with  an  arranged  sequence 
of  events,  live  with  a  certain  degree  of  eventful  decorum, 
through  that  portion  of  their  lives  which  is  to  be  portray- 
ed. I  hesitated,  but  allowed  myself  to  be  allured  to  what 
I  felt  to  be  wrong,  much  dreading  the  event.  How  seldom 
is  it  that  theories  stand  the  wear  and  tear  of  practice !  I 
will  not  say  that  the  story  which  came  was  good,  but  it 
was  received  with  greater  favour  than  any  I  had  written 
before  or  have  written  since.  I  think  that  almost  any- 
thing would  have  been  then  accepted  coming  under  Thack- 
eray's editorship. 

I  was  astonished  that  work  should  be  required  in  such 
haste,  knowing  that  much  preparation  had  been  made,  and 

^  I  had  begim  an  Irish  story  and  half  finished  it,  which  would 
reach  just  the  required  length.  Would  that  do  ?  I  asked.  1  was  civil- 
ly told  that  my  Irish  story  would  no  doubt  be  charming,  but  was  not 
quite  the  thing  that  was  wanted.  Could  I  not  begin  a  new  one — 
English — and  if  possible  about  clerg}Tnen  ?  The  details  were  so  in- 
teresting that  had  a  couple  of  archbishops  been  demanded,  I  should 
have  produced  them. 


52  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

that  the  service  of  almost  any  English  novelist  might  have 
been  obtained  if  asked  for  in  due  time.  It  was  my  readi- 
ness that  was  needed,  rather  than  any  other  gift !  The 
riddle  was  read  to  me  after  a  time.  Thackeray  had  him- 
self intended  to  begin  with  one  of  his  own  great  novels, 
but  had  put  it  off  till  it  w\as  too  late.  Lovel  the  Widower 
was  commenced  at  the  same  time  with  my  own  story,  but 
Lovel  the  Widower  was  not  substantial  enough  to  appear 
as  the  principal  joint  at  the  banquet.  Though  your  guests 
will  undoubtedly  dine  off  the  little  delicacies  you  provide 
for  them,  there  must  be  a  heavy  saddle  of  mutton  among 
the  viands  prepared.  I  was  the  saddle  of  mutton,  Thack- 
eray having  omitted  to  get  his  joint  down  to  the  fire  in  time 
enough.  My  fitness  lay  in  my  capacity  for  quick  roasting. 
It  may  be  interesting  to  give  a  list  of  the  contributors 
to  the  first  number.  My  novel  called  Framley  Parsonage 
came  first.  At  this  banquet  the  saddle  of  mutton  was 
served  before  the  delicacies.  Then  there  was  a  paper  by 
Sir  John  Bowring  on  The  Chinese  and  Outer  Barbarians. 
The  commencing  number  of  Lovel  the  Widower  followed. 
George  Lewes  came  next  with  his  first  chapters  of  Studies 
in  Animal  Life.  Then  there  was  Father  Front's  Inaugu- 
ration Ode,  dedicated  to  the  author  of  Vanity  Fair  — 
which  should  have  led  the  way.  I  need  hardly  say  that 
Father  Prout  was  the  Rev.  F.  Mahony.  Then  followed  Our 
Volunteers,  by  Sir  John  Burgoyne ;  A  Man  of  Letters  of  the 
Last  Generation,  by  Thornton  Hunt ;  The  Search  for  Sir 
John  Franklin,  from  a  private  journal  of  an  officer  of  the 
Fox,  now  Sir  Allen  Young;  and  The  First  Morning  of 
1860,  by  Mrs.  Archer  Clive.  The  number  was  concluded 
by  the  first  of  those  Roundabout  Papers  by  Thackeray 
himself,  which  became  so  delightful  a  portion  of  the  litera' 
ture  of  The  Cornhill  Magazine. 


L]  BIOGRAPHICAL.  53 

It  would  be  out  of  my  power,  and  hardly  interesting,  to 
give  an  entire  list  of  those  who  wrote  for  The  Cornhill 
under  Thackeray's  editorial  direction.  But  I  may  name 
a- few,  to  show  how  strong  was  the  support  which  he  re- 
ceived. Those  who  contributed  to  the  first  number  I  have 
named.  Among  those  who  followed  were  Alfred  Tenny- 
son, Jacob  Omnium,  Lord  Houghton,  William  Russell,  Mrs. 
Beecher  Stowe,  Mrs.  Browning,  Robert  Bell,  George  Au- 
gustus Sala,  Mrs.  Gaskell,  James  Ilinton,  Mary  Howitt,  John 
Kaye,  Cliarlcs  Lever,  Frederick  Locker,  Laurence  Oliphant, 
John  Ruskin,  Fitzjames  Stephen,  T.  A.  Trollope,  Henry 
Thompson,  Herman  Merivale,  Adelaide  Proctor,  -Matthew 
Arnold,  the  present  Lord  Lytton,  and  Miss  Thackeray,  now 
Mrs.  Ritchie.  Thackeray  continued  the  editorship  for  two 
years  and  four  months,  namely,  up  to  April,  1862  ;  but,  as 
all  readers  will  remember,  he  continued  to  write  for  it  till 
he  died,  the  day  before  Christmas  Day,  in  1863.  His  last 
contribution  was,  I  think,  a  paper  written  for  and  publish- 
ed in  the  November  number,  called  ''^Strange  to  say  on 
Club  Pai^er^''  in  which  he  vindicated  Lord  Clyde  from  the 
accusation  of  having  taken  the  club  stationery  home  with 
him.  It  was  not  a  great  subject,  for  no  one  could  or  did 
believe  that  the  Field  -  Marshal  had  been  guilty  of  any 
meanness;  but  the  handling  of  it  has  made  it  interesting, 
and  his  indignation  has  made  it  beautiful. 

The  magazine  was  a  great  success,  but  justice  compels 
me  to  say  that  Thackeray  w\as  not  a  good  editor.  As  he 
would  have  been  an  indifferent  civil  servant,  an  indifferent 
member  of  Parliament,  so  was  he  perfunctory  as  an  editor. 
It  has  sometimes  been  thought  well  to  select  a  popular  lit- 
erary man  as  an  editor ;  first,  because  his  name  will  at- 
tract, and  then  with  an  idea  that  he  who  can  write  well 
himself  will  be  a  competent  judge  of  the  w't.ngs  of  oth- 


54  THACKERAY.  [chai., 

ers.  The  first  may  sell  a  magazine,  but  will  hardly  mate 
it  good ;  and  the  second  will  not  avail  much,  unless  the 
editor  so  situated  be  patient  enough  to  read  wbat  is  sent 
to  him.  Of  a  magazine  editor  it  is  required  that  he  should 
be  patient,  scrupulous,  judicious,  but  above  all  things  hard- 
hearted. I  think  it  may  be  doubted  whether  Thackeray 
did  bring  himself  to  read  the  basketfuls  of  manuscripts 
with  which  he  was  deluged,  but  he  probably  did,  sooner  or 
later,  read  the  touching  little  private  notes  by  which  they 
were  accompanied — the  heartrending  appeals,  in  which  he 
was  told  that  if  this  or  the  other  little  article  could  be 
accepted  and  paid  for,  a  starving  family  might  be  saved 
from  starvation  for  a  month.  He  tells  us  how  he  felt  on 
receiving  such  letters  in  one  of  his  Roundabout  Pcqyers, 
which  he  calls  "  Thorns  in  the  cushion.''^  "  How  am  I  to 
know,"  he  says — "  though  to  be  sure  I  begin  to  know  now 
— ras  I  take  the  letters  off  the  tray,  which  of  those  enve- 
lopes contains  a  real  bona  fide  letter,  and  which  a  thorn  ? 
One  of  the  best  invitations  this  year  I  mistook  for  a  thorn 
letter,  and  kept  it  without  opening."  Then  he  gives  the 
sample  of  a  thorn  letter.  It  is  from  a  governess  with 
a  poem,  and  with  a  prayer  for  insertion  and  payment. 
"We  have  known  better  days,  sir.  I  have  a  sick  and 
widowed  mother  to  maintain,  and  little  brothers  and  sis- 
ters who  look  to  me."  He  could  not  stand  this,  and  the 
money  would  be  sent,  out  of  his  own  pocket,  though  the 
poem  might  be — postponed,  till  happily  it  should  be  lost. 

From  such  material  a  good  editor  could  not  be  made. 
Nor,  in  truth,  do  I  think  that  he  did  much  of  the  editorial 
work.  I  had  once  made  an  arrangement,  not  with  Thack- 
eray, but  with  the  proprietors,  as  to  some  little  story.  The 
story  was  sent  back  to  me  by  Thackeray — rejected.  Vir- 
ginibus  puerisque  f     That  was  the  gist  of  his  objection. 


I.]  BIOGRAPHICAL.  65 

There  was  a  project  in  a  gentleman's  mind  —  as  told  in 
my  story — to  run  away  with  a  married  woman !  Thack- 
eray's letter  was  very  kind,  very  regretful — full  of  apology 
for  such  treatment  to  such  a  contributor.  But —  Virgini- 
bus  puerisque  !  I  was  quite  sure  that  Thackeray  had  not 
taken  the  trouble  to  read  the  story  himself.  Some  moral 
deputy  had  read  it,  and  disapproving,  no  doubt  properly, 
of  the  little  project  to  which  I  have  alluded,  had  incited 
the  editor  to  use  his  authority.  That  Thackeray  had  suf- 
fered when  he  wrote  it  was  easy  to  see,  fearing  that  he 
was  giving  pain  to  one  he  would  fain  have  pleased.  I 
wrote  him  a  long  letter  in  return,  as  full  of  drollery  as  I 
knew  how  to  make  it.  In  four  or  five  days  there  came  a 
reply  in  the  same  spirit — boiling  over  with  fun.  He  had 
kept  my  letter  by  him,  not  daring  to  open  it — as  he  says 
that  he  did  with  that  eligible  invitation.  At  last  he  had 
given  it  to  one  of  his  girls  to  examine — to  see  whether 
the  thorn  would  be  too  sharp,  whether  I  had  turned  upon 
him  with  reproaches.  A  man  so  susceptible,  so  prone  to 
work  by  fits  and  starts,  so-  unmethodical,  could  not  have 
been  a  good  editor. 

In  1862  he  went  into  the  new  bouse  which  he  had  built 
for  himself  at  Palace  Green.  I  remember  well,  while  this 
was  still  being  built,  how  his  friends  used  to  discuss  his 
imprudence  in  building  it.  Though  he  had  done  well 
with  himself,  and  had  made  and  was  makino-  a  larire  in- 
come,  was  he  entitled  to  live  in  a  house  the  rent  of  which 
could  not  be  counted  at  less  than  from  five  hundred  to  six 
hundred  pounds  a  year?  Before  he  had  been  there  two 
years,  he  solved  the  question  by  dying — when  the  house 
was  sold  for  two  thousand  pounds  more  than  it  had  cost. 
He  himself,  in  speaking  of  his  project,  was  wont  to  declare 
that  he  was  laying  out  his  money  in  the  best  way  he  could 


56  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

for  tho  interest  of  his  cMldren;  and  it  turned  out  that 
he  was  right. 

In  1863  he  died  in  the  house  which  he  had  built,  and 
at  the  period  of  his  death  was  writing  a  new  novel  in 
numbers,  called  Denis  Duval.  In  The  Cornhill^  The  Ad- 
ventures of  Philip  had  appeared.  This  new  enterprise 
was  destined  for  commencement  on  1st  January,  1864, 
and,  though  the  writer  was  gone,  it  kept  its  promise,  as  far 
as  it  went.  Three  numbers,  and  what  might  probably 
have  been  intended  for  half  of  a  fourth,  appeared.  It 
may  be  seen,  therefore,  that  he  by  no  means  held  to  my 
theory,  that  the  author  should  see  the  end  of  his  work  be- 
fore the  public  sees  the  commencement.  But  neither  did 
Dickens  or  Mrs.  Gaskell,  both  of  whom  died  with  stories 
not  completed,  which,  when  they  died,  were  in  the  course 
of  publication.  All  the  evidence  goes  against  the  neces- 
sity of  such  precaution.  Nevertheless,  were  I  giving  ad- 
vice to  a  tiro  in  novel  writing,  I  should  recommend  it. 

With  the  last  chapter  of  Denis  Duval  was  published  in 
the  magazine  a  set  of  notes  on  the  book,  taken  for  the 
most  part  from  Thackeray's  own  papers,  and  showing  how 
much  collateral  work  he  had  given  to  the  fabrication  of 
his  novel.  No  doubt  in  preparing  other  tales,  especially 
Esmond,  a  very  large  amount  of  such  collateral  labour  was 
found  necessary.  lie  was  a  man  who  did  very  much  of 
such  work,  delighting  to  deal  in  little  historical  incidents. 
Tlicy  will  be  found  in  almost  everything  that  he  did,  and 
I  do  not  know  that  he  was  ever  accused  of  gross  mistakes. 
But  I  doubt  whether  on  that  account  he  should  be  called 
a  laborious  man.  He  could  go  down  to  AVinchelsea,  when 
writing  about  the  little  town,  to  see  in  which  way  the 
streets  lay,  and  to  provide  himself  with  what  we  call  local 
colouring.     lie  could  jot  down  the   suggestions,  as  they 


I.]  BIOGRAPHICAL.  57 

came  to  his  mind,  of  his  future  story.  There  was  an  ir- 
regularity in  such  work  which  was  to  his  taste.  His  very 
notes  would  be  delightful  to  read,  partaking  of  the  nature 
of  pearls  when  prepared  only  for  his  own  use.  But  he 
could  not  bring  himself  to  sit  at  his  desk  and  do  an  allot- 
ted task  day  after  day.  He  accomplished  what  must  be 
considered  as  quite  a  sufficient  life's  work.  He  had  about 
twenty-five  years  for  the  purpose,  and  that  which  he  has 
left  is  an  ample  produce  for  the  time.  Nevertheless  he 
was  a  man  of  fits  and  starts,  who,  not  having  been  in  his 
early  years  drilled  to  method,  never  achieved  it  in  his  career. 
He  died  on  the  day  before  Christmas  Day,  as  has  been 
said  above,  very  suddenly,  in  his  bed,  early  in  the  morning, 
in  the  fifty-third  year  of  his  life.  To  those  who  saw  him 
about  in  the  world  there  seemed  to  be  no  reason  why  he 
should  not  continue  his  career  for  the  next  twenty  years. 
But  those  who  knew  him  were  so  well  aware  of  his  con- 
stant sufferings,  that,  though  they  expected  no  sudden  ca- 
tastrophe, they  were  hardly  surprised  when  it  came.  His 
death  w-as  probably  caused  by  those  spasms  of  which  he 
had  complained  ten  years  before,  in  his  letter  to  Mr.  Reed. 
On  the  last  day  but  one  of  the  year,  a  crowd  of  sorrowing 
friends  stood  over  his  grave  as  he  was  laid  to  rest  in  Ken- 
sal  Green ;  and,  as  quickly  afterwards  as  it  could  be  exe- 
cuted, a  bust  to  his  memory  was  put  up  in  Westminster 
Abbey.  It  is  a  fine  work  of  art,  by  Marochetti ;  but,  as  a 
likeness,  is,  I  think,  less  effective  than  that  which  was  mod- 
elled, and  then  given  to  the  Garrick  Club,  by  Durham,  and 
has  lately  been  put  into  marble,  and  now  stands  in  the  up- 
per vestibule  of  the  club.  Neither  of  them,  in  my  opinion, 
give  so  accurate  an  idea  of  the  man  as  a  statuette  in  bronze, 
by  Boehm,  of  which  two  or  three  copies  were  made.  One 
of  them  is  in  my  possession.    It  has  been  alleged,  in  refer* 


58  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

ence  to  this,  that  there  is  something  of  a  caricature  in  the 
Icngthiness  of  the  figure,  in  the  two  hands  thrust  into  the 
trousers  pockets,  and  in  the  protrusion  of  the  chin.  But 
this  feeling  has  originated  in  the  general  idea  that  any 
face,  or  any  figure,  not  made  by  the  artist  more  beautiful 
or  more  graceful  than  the  original  is  an  injustice.  The 
face  must  be  smoother,  the  pose  of  the  body  must  be  more 
dignified,  the  proportions  more  perfect,  than  in  the  person 
represented,  or  satisfaction  is  not  felt.  Mr.  Boehm  has 
certainly  not  flattered,  but,  as  far  as  my  eye  can  judge,  he 
has  given  the  figure  of  the  man  exactly  as  he  used  to  stand 
before  us.  I  have  a  portrait  of  him  in  crayon,  by  Samuel 
Lawrence,  as  like,  but  hardly  as  natural. 

A  little  before  his  death  Thackeray  told  me  that  he  had 
then  succeeded  in  replacing  the  fortune  which  he  had  lost 
as  a  young  man.  He  had,  in  fact,  done  better,  for  he  left 
an  income  of  seven  hundred  and  fifty  pounds  behind  him. 

It  has  been  said  of  Thackeray  that  he  was  a  cynic. 
This  has  been  said  so  generally,  that  the  charge  against 
him  has  become  proverbial.  This,  stated  barely,  leaves 
one  of  two  impressions  on  the  mind,  or  perhaps  the  two 
together — that  this  cynicism  was  natural  to  his  character 
and  came  out  in  his  life,  or  that  it  is  the  characteristic  of 
his  writings.  Of  the  nature  of  his  writings  generally,  I 
will  speak  in  the  last  chapter  of  this  little  book.  As  to 
his  personal  character  as  a  cynic,  I  must  find  room  to 
quote  the  following  first  stanzas  of  the  little  poem  which 
appeared  to  his  memory  in  Punch,  from  the  pen  of  Shir- 
ley Brooks : 

He  was  a  cynic !     By  his  life  all  wrought 

Of  generous  acts,  mild  words,  and  gentle  ways ; 

His  heart  wide  open  to  all  kindly  thought, 

His  hand  so  quick  to  give,  his  tongue  to  praise ! 


I.]  BIOGRAnilCAL.  59 

He  was  a  cynic !     You  might  read  it  writ 

In  that  broad  brow,  crowned  with  its  silver  hair ; 

In  those  blue  eyes,  with  childlike  candour  lit, 
In  that  sweet  smile  his  lips  were  wont  to  wear ! 

He  was  a  c}Tiic !    By  the  love  that  clung 

About  him  from  his  children,  friends,  and  kin ; 

By  the  sharp  pain  light  pen  and  gossip  tongue 
Wrought  ill  him,  chafing  the  soft  heart  within ! 

The  spirit  and  nature  of  the  man  have  been  caught  here 
with  absolute  truth.  A  public  man  should  of  course  be 
judged  from  liis  public  work.  If  he  wrote  as  a  cynic — a 
point  which  I  will  not  discuss  here — it  may  be  fair  that 
he  who  is  to  be  known  as  a  writer  should  be  so  called. 
But,  as  a  man,  I  protest  that  it  would  be  hard  to  find  an 
individual  farther  removed  from  the  character.  Over  and 
outside  his  fancy,  which  was  the  gift  which  made  him  so 
remarkable — a  certain  feminine  softness  was  the  most  re- 
markable trait  about  him.  To  give  some  immediate  pleas- 
ure was  the  great  delight  of  his  life — a  sovereign  to  a 
schoolboy,  gloves  to  a  girl,  a  dinner  to  a  man,  a  compli- 
ment to  a  woman.  His  charity  was  overflowing.  His 
generosity  excessive.  I  heard  once  a  story  of  woe  from  a 
man  who  was  the  dear  friend  of  both  of  us.  The  gentle- 
man wanted  a  large  sum  of  money  instantly — something 
under  two  thousand  pounds — had  no  natural  friends  who 
could  provide  it,  but  must  go  utterly  to  the  wall  without 
it.  Pondering  over  this  sad  condition  of  things  just  re- 
vealed to  me,  I  met  Thackeray  between  the  two  mounted 
heroes  at  the  Horse  Guards,  and  told  him  the  story.  "  Do 
you  mean  to  say  that  I  am  to  find  two  thousand  pounds?" 
he  said,  angrily,  with  some  expletives.  I  explained  that 
I  had  not  even  suggested  the  doing  of  anything  —  only 

that  we  might  discuss  the  matter.     Then  there  came  over 
E 


60  THACKERAY.  [chap,  l 

bis  face  a  peculiar  smile,  and  a  wink  in  his  eye,  and  lie 
whispered  his  suggestion,  as  though  half  ashamed  of  his 
meanness.  "  I'll  go  half,"  he  said,  "  if  anybody  will  do 
the  rest."  And  he  did  go  half,  at  a  day  or  two's  notice, 
though  the  gentleman  was  no  more  than  simply  a  friend. 
I  am  glad  to  be  able  to  add  that  the  money  was  quickly 
repaid.  I  could  tell  various  stories  of  the  same  kind,  only 
that  I  lack  space,  and  that  they,  if  simply  added  one  to 
the  other,  would  lack  interest. 

lie  was  no  cynic,  but  he  was  a  satirist,  and  could  now 
and  then  be  a  satirist  in  conversation,  hitting  very  hard  when 
he  did  hit.  AVhen  he  was  in  America,  he  met  at  dinner  a 
literary  gentlemen  of  high  character,  middle-aged,  and  most 
dignified  deportment.  The  gentleman  was  one  whose  char- 
acter and  acquirements  stood  very  high — deservedly  so — but 
who,  in  society,  had  that  air  of  wrapping  his  toga  around 
him,  which  adds,  or  is  supposed  to  add,  many  cubits  to  a 
man's  height.  But  he  had  a  broken  nose.  At  dinner  he 
talked  much  of  the  tender  passion,  and  did  so  in  a  man- 
ner which  stirred  up  Thackeray's  feeling  of  the  ridiculous. 
"  What  has  the  world  come  to,"  said  Thackeray,  out  loud 
to  the  table, "  when  two  broken-nosed  old  fogies  like  you 
and  me  sit  talking  about  love  to  each  other !"  The  gen- 
tleman was  astounded,  and  could  only  sit  wrapping  his 
toga  in  silent  dismay  for  the  rest  of  the  evening.  Thack- 
eray then,  as  at  other  similar  times,  had  no  idea  of  giving 
pain,  but  when  he  saw  a  foible  he  put  his  foot  upon  it,  and 
tried  to  stamp  it  out. 

Such  is  my  idea  of  the  man  whom  many  call  a  cynic, 
but  whom  I  regard  as  one  of  the  most  soft-hearted  of  hu- 
man beings,  sweet  as  Charity  itself,  who  went  about  the 
world  dropping  pearls,  doing  good,  and  never  wilfully  in- 
flicting: a  wound. 


CHAPTER  II. 

fraser's  magazine  and  punch. 

How  Thackeray  comraenced  his  connection  with  Fraser'^s 
Magazine  I  am  unable  to  say.  We  know  how  he  liad 
come  to  London  with  a  view  to  a  literary  career,  and  that 
he  had  at  one  time  made  an  attempt  to  earn  his  bread  as 
a  correspondent  to  a  newspaper  from  Paris.  It  is  proba- 
ble that  he  became  acquainted  with  the  redoubtable  Oliver 
Yorke,  otherwise  Dr.  Maginn,  or  some  of  his  staff,  through 
the  connection  which  he  had  thus  opened  with  the  press. 
He  was  not  known,  or  at  any  rate  he  was  unrecognized,  by 
Fraser  in  January,  1835,  in  which  month  an  amusing  cat- 
alogue was  given  of  the  writers  then  employed,  with  por- 
traits of  them  all  seated  at  a  symposium.  I  can  trace  no 
article  to  his  pen  before  November,  1837,  when  the  Yel- 
lowplush  Correspondence  was  commenced,  though  it  is 
hardly  probable  that  he  should  have  commenced  with  a 
work  of  so  much  pretension.  There  had  been  published 
a  volume  called  My  Book,  or  the  Anatormj  of  Conduct,  by 
John  Skelton,  and  a  very  absurd  book  no  doubt  it  was. 
We  may  presume  that  it  contained  maxims  on  etiquette, 
and  that  it  was  intended  to  convey  in  print  those  invalua- 
ble lessons  on  deportment  which,  as  Dickens  has  told  us, 
were  subsequently  given  by  Mr.  Turveydrop,  in  the  acade- 
my kept  by  him  for  that  purpose.     Thackeray  took  this 


62  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

as  his  foundation  for  the  Fashionable  Fax  and  Polite  An- 
nygoats,  by  Jeames  Yellowphish,  with  which  he  commenced 
those  repeated  attacks  against  snobbism  which  he  delight- 
ed to  make  through  a  considerable  portion  of  his  literary 
life.  Oliver  Yorke  has  himself  added  four  or  five  pages 
of  his  own  to  Thackeray's  lucubrations  ;  and  with  the  sec- 
ond, and  some  future  numbers,  there  appeared  illustrations 
by  Thackeray  himself,  illustrations  at  this  time  not  having 
been  common  with  the  magazine.  From  all  this  I  gather 
that  the  author  was  already  held  in  estimation  by  Fra- 
sej'^s  confraternity.  I  remember  well  my  own  delight  with 
Yelloioplush  at  the  time,  and  how  I  inquired  who  was 
the  author.  It  was  then  that  I  first  heard  Thackeray's 
name. 

The  Yellowplush  Papers  were  continued  through  nine 
numbers.  No  further  reference  was  made  to  Mr.  Skelton 
and  his  book  beyond  that  given  at  the  beginning  of  the 
first  number,  and  the  satire  is  only  shown  by  the  attempt 
made  by  Yellowplush,  the  footman,  to  give  his  ideas  gen- 
erally on  the  manners  of  noble  life.  The  idea  seems  to  be 
that  a  gentleman  may,  in  heart  and  in  action,  be  as  vulgar 
as  a  footman.  No  doubt  he  may,  but  the  chances  are  very 
much  that  he  won't.  But  the  virtue  of  the  memoir  does 
not  consist  in  the  lessons,  but  in  the  general  drollery  of 
the  letters.  The  "  orthogwaphy  fs  inaccuwate,"  as  a  cer- 
tain person  says  in  the  memoirs — "so  inaccav\'ate"  as  to 
take  a  positive  study  to  "  compwehend  "  it ;  but  the  joke, 
though  old,  is  so  handled  as  to  be  very  amusing.  Thack- 
eray soon  rushes  away  from  his  criticisms  on  snobbism  to 
other  matters.  There  are  the  details  of  a  card-sharping 
enterprise,  in  which  we  cannot  but  feel  that  we  recognise 
something  of  the  author's  own  experiences  in  the  misfort- 
unes of  Mr.  Dawkins ;  there  is  the  Earl  of  Crab's,  and  then 


n.]  ERASER'S  MAGAZINE  AND  PUNCH.  63 

the  first  of  those  attacts  which  he  was  tempted  to  make 
on  the  absurdities  of  his  brethren  of  letters,  and  the  only 
one  which  now  has  the  appearance  of  having  been  ill-nat- 
ured. His  first  victims  were  Dr.  Dionysius  Lardner  and 
Mr.  Edward  Bulwer  Lytton,  as  he  was  then.  We  can  sur- 
render the  doctor  to  the  whip  of  the  satirist;  and  for 
"Sawedwado;eoro:eearllittnbulwio;,"  as  the  novelist  is  made 
to  call  himself,  we  can  well  believe  that  he  must  himself 
have  enjoyed  the  Yellowplush  Memoirs  if  he  ever  re-read 
them  in  after-life.  The  speech  in  which  he  is  made  to 
dissuade  the  footman  from  joining  the  world  of  letters  is 
so  good  that  I  will  venture  to  insert  it :  "  Bullwig  was  vio- 
lently affected;  a  tear  stood  in  his  glistening  i.  'Yellow- 
plush,' says  he,  seizing  my  hand,  'you  are  right.  Quit 
not  your  present  occupation;  black  boots,  clean  knives, 
wear  plush  all  your  life,  but  don't  turn  literary  man.  Look 
at  me.  I  am  the  first  novelist  in  Europe.  I  have  ranged 
with  eagle  wings  over  the  wide  regions  of  literature,  and 
perched  on  every  eminence  in  its  turn.  I  have  gazed  with 
eagle  eyes  on  the  sun  of  philosophy,  and  fathomed  the 
mysterious  depths  of  the  human  mind.  All  languages  are 
familiar  to  me,  all  thoughts  are  known  to  me,  all  men  un- 
derstood by  me.  I  have  gathered  wisdom  from  the  hon- 
eyed lips  of  Plato,  as  we  wandered  in  the  gardens  of  the 
Academies;  wisdom,  too,  from  the  mouth  of  Job  Johnson, 
as  we  smoked  our  backy  in  Seven  Dials.  Such  must  be 
the  studies,  and  such  is  the  mission,  in  this  world  of  the 
Poet-Philosopher.  But  the  knowledge  is  only  emptiness ; 
the  initiation  is  but  misery  ;  the  initiated  a  man  shunned 
and  banned  by  his  fellows.  Oh  !'  said  Bullwig,  clasping 
his  hands,  and  throwing  his  fine  i's  up  to  the  chandelier, 
*the  curse  of  Pwomethus  descen'ds  upon  his  wace.  Wath 
and  punishment  pursue  them  from  geuewation  to  genewa- 


64  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

tion  !  Wo  to  genius,  the  heaven  -  scaler,  the  fire -stealer! 
Wo  and  thrice-bitter  desolation !  Earth  is  the  woch  on 
which  Zeus,  wemorseless,  stwetches  his  withing  wictim  ; — 
men,  the  vultures  that  feed  and  fatten  on  him.  Ai,  ai !  it 
is  agony  eternal — gwoaning  and  solitawy  despair !  And 
you,  Yellowplush,  would  penetwate  these  mystewies ;  you 
would  waise  the  awful  veil,  and  stand  in  the  twemendous 
Pvvesence.  Beware,  as  you  value  your  peace,  beware ! 
AVithdwaw,  wash  Neophyte  !  For  heaven's  sake  !  0  for 
heaven's  sake !' — Here  he  looked  round  with  agony ; — '  give 
me  a  glass  of  bwandy-and-water,  for  this  clawet  is  begin- 
ning to  disagwee  with  me.'  "  It  was  thus  that  Thackeray 
began  that  vein  of  satire  on  his  contemporaries  of  which 
it  may  be  said  that  the  older  he  grew  the  more  amusing 
it  was,  and  at  the  same  time  less  likely  to  hurt  the  feelings 
of  the  author  satirised. 

The  next  tale  of  any  length  from  Thackeray's  pen,  in 
the  magazine,  was  that  called  Catherine^  which  is  the 
story  taken  from  the  life  of  a  wretched  woman  called 
Catherine  Hayes.  It  is  certainly  not  pleasant  reading, 
and  was  not  written  with  a  pleasant  purpose.  It  assumes 
to  have  come  from  the  pen  of  Ikey  Solomon,  of  Ilorse- 
monger  Lane,  and  its  object  is  to  show  how  disgusting 
would  be  the  records  of  thieves,  cheats,  and  murderers  if 
their  doings  and  language  were  described  according  to 
their  nature,  instead  of  being  handled  in  such  a  way  as 
to  create  sympathy,  and  therefore  imitation.  Bulwer's 
Eugene  Ai-am,  Harrison  Ainsworth's  Jack  Shcppard,  and 
Dickens'  Nancy  were  in  his  mind,  and  it  was  thus  that 
he  preached  his  sermon  against  the  selection  of  such 
heroes  and  heroines  by  the  novelists  of  the  day.  "  Be  it 
granted,"  he  says,  in  his  epilogue,  "  Solomon  is  dull ;  but 
don't  attack  his  morality.     He  humbly  submits  that,  in 


u.]  FRASEK'S  MAGAZINE  AND  PUNCH.  66 

his  poem,  no  man  shall  mistake  virtue  for  vice,  no  man 
shall  allow  a  single  sentiment  of  pity  or  admiration  to 
enter  his  bosom  for  any  character  in  the  poem,  it  being 
from  beginning  to  end  a  scene  of  unmixed  rascality,  per- 
formed by  persons  who  never  deviate  into  good  feeling." 
The  intention  is  intelligible  enough,  but  such  a  story 
neither  could  have  been  written  nor  read — certainly  not 
written  by  Thackeray,  nor  read  by  the  ordinary  reader  of 
a  first-class  mao-azine — had  he  not  been  enabled  to  adorn 
it  by  infinite  wit.  Captain  Brock,  though  a  brave  man,  is 
certainly  not  described  as  an  interesting  or  gallant  soldier ; 
but  he  is  possessed  of  great  resources.  Captain  Macshane, 
too,  is  a  thorough  blackguard ;  but  he  is  one  with  a  dash 
of  loyalty  about  him,  so  that  the  reader  can  almost  sympa- 
thise with  him,  and  is  tempted  to  say  that  Ikey  Solomon 
has  not  quite  kept  his  promise. 

Catherine  appeared  in  1839  and  1840.  In  the  latter 
of  those  years  The  Shabby  Genteel  story  also  came  out. 
Then,  in  1841,  there  followed  The  History  of  Samuel 
Titmarsh  and  the  Great  Hoggarty  Diamond,  illustrated 
6y  SamueFs  cousin,  Michael  Angelo.  But  though  so  an- 
nounced in  Fraser,  there  were  no  illustrations,  and  those 
attached  to  the  story  in  later  editions  are  not  taken  from 
sketches  by  Thackeray.  This,  as  far  as  I  know,  was  the 
first  use  of  the  name  Titmarsh,  and  seems  to  indicate 
some  intention  on  the  part  of  the  author  of  creating  a 
hoax  as  to  two  personages — one  the  writer  and  the  other 
the  illustrator.  If  it  were  so,  he  must  soon  have  dropped 
the  idea.  In  the  last  paragraph  he  has  shaken  off  his 
cousin  Michael.  The  main  object  of  the  story  is  to  ex- 
pose the  villany  of  bubble  companies,  and  the  danger  they 
run  who  venture  to  have  dealings  with  city  matters  which 
they  do   not   understand.      I  cannot  but  think  that  he 

4 


66  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

altered  his  mind  and  changed  his  purpose  while  he  was 
writing  it,  actuated  probably  by  that  editorial  monition 
as  to  its  length. 

In  1842  were  commenced  The  Confessions  of  George 
Fitz-Boodle,  which,  were  continued  into  1843.  I  do  not 
think  that  they  attracted  much  attention,  or  that  they 
have  become  peculiarly  popular  since.  They  are  supposed 
to  contain  tlie  reminiscences  of  a  younger  son,  who  moans 
over  his  poverty,  complains  of  womankind  generally, 
laughs  at  the  world  all  round,  and  intersperses  his  pages 
with  one  or  two  excellent  ballads.  I  quote  one,  written 
for  the  sake  of  affording  a  parody,  with  the  parody  along 
with  it,  because  the  two  together  give  so  strong  an  ex- 
ample of  the  condition  of  Thackeray's  mind  in  regard  to 
literary  products.  The  "  humbug "  of  everything,  the 
pretence,  the  falseness  of  affected  sentiment,  the  remote- 
ness of  poetical  pathos  from  the  true  condition  of  the 
average  minds  of  men  and  women,  struck  him  so  strongly, 
that  he  sometimes  allowed  himself  almost  to  feel — or  at 
any  rate,  to  say — that  poetical  expression,  as  being  above 
nature,  must  be  unnatural.  He  had  declared  to  himself 
that  all  humbug  w^as  odious,  and  should  be  by  him  laughed 
down  to  the  extent  of  his  capacity.  His  Yellowplush, 
his  Catherine  Hayes,  his  Fitz-Boodle,  his  Barry  Lyndon, 
and  Becky  Sharp,  with  many  others  of  this  kind,  were 
all  invented  and  treated  for  this  purpose  and  after  this 
fashion.  I  shall  have  to  say  more  on  the  same  subject 
when  I  come  to  The  Snob  Paj^ers.  In  this  instance  he 
wrote  a  very  pretty  ballad.  The  Willow  Tree — so  good 
that  if  left  by  itself  it  would  create  no  idea  of  absurdity 
or  extravagant  pathos  in  the  mind  of  the  ordinary  reader — 
simply  that  ho  might  render  his  own  work  absurd  by  his 
own  parody. 


CI.J 


ERASER'S  MAGAZINE  AND  PUNCH. 


6*7 


THE  Wn.LOW-TREE. 
No.  I. 

Know  ye  the  willow-tree, 

Whose  gray  leaves  quiver, 
Whispering  gloomily 

To  yon  pale  river  ? 
Lady,  at  eventide 

Wander  not  near  it ! 
They  say  its  branches  hide 

A  sad  lost  spirit ! 

Once  to  the  willow-tree 

A  maid  came  fearful, 
Pale  seemed  her  cheek  to  be, 

Her  blue  eye  tearful. 
Soon  as  she  saw  the  tree. 

Her  steps  moved  fleeter. 
No  one  was  there — ah  me  !— 

No  one  to  meet  her ! 

Quick  beat  her  heart  to  hear 

The  far  bells'  chime 
Toll  from  the  chapel-tower 

The  trysting-time. 
But  the  red  sun  went  down 

In  golden  flame, 
And  though  she  looked  around. 

Yet  no  one  came ! 

Presently  came  the  night. 

Sadly  to  greet  her — 
Moon  in  her  silver  light. 

Stars  in  their  glitter. 
Then  sank  the  moon  away 

Under  the  billow. 
Still  wept  the  maid  alone — ■ 

There  by  the  willow !    , 


THE  WILLOW-TREE. 
No.  II. 

Long  by  the  willow-tree 
Vainly  they  sought  her. 

Wild  rang  the  mother's  screams 
O'er  the  gray  water. 

"  Where  is  my  lovely  one  ? 
Where  is  my  daughter  ? 

Rouse  thee,  sir  constable — 

Rouse  thee  and  look. 
Fisherman,  bring  your  net, 

Boatman,  your  hook. 
Beat  in  the  lily-beds. 

Dive  in  the  brook." 

Vainly  the  constable 
Shouted  and  called  her. 

Vainly  the  fisherman 
Beat  the  green  alder. 

Vainly  he  threw  the  net. 
Never  it  hauled  her ! 

Mother  beside  the  fire 

Sat,  her  night-cap  in ; 
Father  in  easy-chair, 

Gloomily  napping ; 
When  at  the  window-sill 

Came  a  light  tapping. 

And  a  pale  countenance 

Looked  through  the  casement. 
Loud  beat  the  mother's  heart, 

Sick  with  amazement, 
And  at  the  vision  which 

Came  to  surprise  her ! 
Shrieking  in  an  agony — 

'•  Lor' !  it's  Elizar !" 


68 


THACKERAY. 


fCHAP. 


Through  the  long  darkness, 

By  the  stream  rolling, 
Hour  after  hour  went  on 

Tolling  and  tolling. 
Long  was  the  darkness, 

Lonely  and  stilly. 
Shrill  came  the  night  wind, 

Piercing  and  chilly. 

Shrill  blew  the  morning  breeze, 

Biting  and  cold. 
Bleak  peers  the  gray  dawn 

Over  the  wold ! 
Bleak  over  moor  and  stream 

Looks  the  gray  dawn, 
Gray  with  dishevelled  hair. 
Still  stands  the  willow  there — 

The  maid  is  gone ! 

Domine,  Domine ! 
Sing  we  a  litany — 
Sing  for  poor  maiden-hearts 
broken  and  weary ; 
Sing  we  a  litany, 
Wail  we  and  weep  we  a 
wild  miserere ! 


Yes,  'twas  Elizabeth ; — 

Yes,  'twas  their  girl ; 
Pale  was  her  cheek,  and  her 

Hair  out  of  curl. 
"  Mother  !"  the  loved  one, 

Blushing  exclaimed, 
"  Let  not  your  innocent 

Lizzy  be  blamed. 

Yesterday,  going  to  Aunt 

Jones's  to  tea. 
Mother,  dear  mother,  I 

Forgot  the  door-key ! 
And  as  the  night  was  cold, 

And  the  way  steep, 
Mrs.  Jones  kept  me  to 

Breakfast  and  sleep." 

Whether  her  pa  and  ma 

Fully  believed  her. 
That  we  shall  never  know. 

Stern  they  received  her ; 
And  for  the  work  of  that 

Cruel,  though  short,  night — 
Sent  her  to  bed  without 

Tea  for  a  fortnight. 

Moral. 

Hey  diddle  diddlety, 
Cat  and  the  fiddlety, 
Maidens  of  England  take 
caution  by  she ! 
Let  love  and  suicide 
Never  tempt  you  aside. 
And  always  remember  to  take 
the  door-key ! 

Mr.  George  Fitz-Boodle  gave  his  name  to  other  narra- 
tives beyond  his  own  Confessions.     A  series  of  stories  was 


n.]  FRASER'S  MAGAZINE  AND  PUNCH.  69 

carried  on  by  bim  in  Fraser^  called  Men's  Wives,  contain- 
ing three :  Ravenwing,  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Frank  Berry,  and 
Dennis  Hoggarty^s  Wife.  The  first  chapter  in  Mr.  and 
Mrs.  Frank  Berry  describes  "The  Fight  at  Slaughter 
House."  Slaughter  House,  as  Mr.  Vcnables  reminded  us 
in  the  last  chapter,  was  near  Smithfield,  in  London — the 
school  which  afterwards  became  Grey  Friars;  and  the 
fight  between  Biggs  and  Berry  is  the  record  of  one  which 
took  place  in  the  flesh  when  Thackeray  was  at  the  Charter 
House.  But  Mr.  Fitz- Boodle's  name  was  afterwards  at- 
tached to  a  greater  work  than  these,  to  a  work  so  great 
that  subsequent  editors  have  thought  him  to  be  unworthy 
of  the  honour.  In  the  January  number,  1844,  of  Fraser^s 
Magazine,  are  commenced  the  Memoirs  of  Barry  Lyndon, 
and  the  authorship  is  attributed  to  Mr.  B'itz-Boodle.  The 
title  given  in  the  magazine  was  The  Luck  of  Barry  Lyn- 
don :  a  Romance  of  the  last  Century.  By  Fitz-Boodle. 
In  the  collected  edition  of  Thackeray's  works  the  Memoirs 
are  given  as  "  Written  by  himself,"  and  were,  I  presume, 
so  brought  out  by  Thackeray,  after  they  had  appeared  in 
Fraser.  Why  Mr.  George  Fitz-Boodle  should  have  been 
robbed  of  so  great  an  honour  I  do  not  know. 

In  imagination,  language,  construction,  and  general  lit- 
erar}'  capacity,  Thackeray  never  did  anything  more  re- 
markable than  Barry  Lyndon.  I  have  quoted  the  words 
which  he  put  into  the  mouth  of  Ikey  Solomon,  declaring 
that  in  the  story  which  he  has  there  told  he  has  created 
nothing  but  disgust  for  the  wicked  characters  he  has  pro- 
duced, and  that  he  has  "  used  his  humble  endeavours  to 
cause  the  public  also  to  hate  them."  Here,  in  Barry  Lyn- 
don, he  has,  probably  unconsciously,  acted  in  direct  oppo- 
sition to  his  own  principles.  Barry  Lyndon  is  as  great  a 
scoundrel  as  the  mind  of  man  ever  conceived.     He  is  one 


70  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

who  might  have  taken  as  his  motto  Satan's  words :  "  Evil, 
be  thou  my  good."  And  yet  his  story  is  so  written  that 
it  is  almost  impossible  not  to  entertain  something  of  a 
friendlv  feelino-  for  him.  He  tells  his  own  adventures  as  a 
card  -  sharper,  bully,  and  liar ;  as  a  heartless  wretch,  who 
had  neither  love  nor  gratitude  in  his  composition ;  who 
had  no  sense  even  of  loyalty ;  who  regarded  gambling  as 
the  highest  occupation  to  which  a  man  could  devote  him- 
self, and  fraud  as  always  justified  by  success ;  a  man  pos- 
sessed by  all  meannesses  except  cowardice.  And  the  reader 
is  so  carried  away  by  his  frankness  and  energy  as  almost 
to  rejoice  when  he  succeeds,  and  to  grieve  with  him  when 
he  is  brought  to  the  ground. 

The  man  is  perfectly  satisfied  as  to  the  reasonableness 
— I  might  almost  say,  as  to  the  rectitude — of  his  own  con- 
duct throughout.  He  is  one  of  a  decayed  Irish  family, 
that  could  boast  of  good  blood.  His  father  had  obtained 
possession  of  the  remnants  of  the  property  by  turning 
Protestant,  thus  ousting  the  elder  brother,  who  later  on  be- 
comes his  nephew's  confederate  in  gambling.  The  elder 
brother  is  true  to  the  old  religion,  and  as  the  law  stood  in 
the  last  century,  the  younger  brother,  by  changing  his  re- 
ligion, was  able  to  turn  him  out.  Barry,  when  a  boy, 
learns  the  slang  and  the  gait  of  the  debauched  gentlemen 
of  the  day.  He  is  specially  proud  of  being  a  gentleman 
by  birth  and  manners.  He  had  been  kidnapped,  and  made 
to  serve  as  a  common  soldier,  but  boasts  that  he  was  at 
once  fit  for  the  occasion  when  enabled  to  show  as  a  court 
gentleman.  "  I  came  to  it  at  once,"  he  says,  "  and  as  if  I 
had  never  done  anything  else  all  my  life.  I  had  a  gentle- 
man to  wait  upon  me,  a  French  frlseur  to  dress  my  hair  of 
a  morning.  I  knew  the  taste  of  chocolate  as  by  intuition 
almost,  and  could  distinguish  between  the  right  Spanish 


n.]  FRASER'S  MAGAZINE  AND  PUNCH.  71 

and  the  French  before  I  bad  been  a  week  in  my  new  posi- 
tion. I  bad  rings  on  all  my  fingers  and  watches  in  both 
my  fobs  —  canes,  trinkets,  and  snuffboxes  of  all  sorts.  I 
had  the  finest  natural  taste  for  lace  and  china  of  any  man 
I  ever  knew." 

To  dress  well,  to  wear  a  sword  with  a  grace,  to  carry 
away  his  plunder  with  affected  indifference,  and  to  appear 
to  be  equally  easy  when  he  loses  his  last  ducat,  to  be 
agreeable  to  women,  and  to  look  like  a  gentleman — these 
are  his  accomplishments.  In  one  place  he  rises  to  the 
height  of  a  grand  professor  in  the  art  of  gambling,  and 
^ives  his  lessons  with  almost  a  noble  air.  "  Play  grandly, 
honourably.  Be  not,  of  course,  cast  down  at  losing ;  but 
above  all,  be  not  eager  at  winning,  as  mean  souls  are." 
And  he  boasts  of  his  accomplishments  with  so  much  elo- 
quence as  to  make  the  reader  sure  that  he  believes  in 
them.  He  is  quite  pathetic  over  himself,  and  can  describe 
with  heartrending  words  the  evils  that  befall  him  when 
others  use  against  him  successfully  any  of  the  arts  which 
he  practises  himself. 

The  marvel  of  the  book  is  not  so  much  that  the  hero 
should  evidently  think  well  of  himself,  as  that  the  author 
should  so  tell  his  story  as  to  appear  to  be  altogether  on 
the  hero's  side.  In  Catherine,  the  horrors  described  are 
most  truly  disgusting  —  so  much  that  the  story,  though 
very  clever,  is  not  pleasant  reading.  The  Memoirs  of 
Barry  Lyndon  are  very  pleasant  to  read.  There  is  noth- 
ing to  shock  or  disgust.  The  style  of  narrative  is  exactly 
that  which  might  be  used  as  to  the  exploits  of  a  man 
whom  the  author  intended  to  represent  as  deserving  of 
sympathy  and  praise — so  that  the  reader  is  almost  brought 
to  sympathise.  But  I  should  be  doing  an  injustice  to 
Thackeray  if  I  were  to  leave  an  impression  that  he  had 


72  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

taught  lessons  tending  to  evil  practice,  such  as  he  supposed 
to  have  been  left  by  Jack  Shejppard  or  Eugene  Aram. 
No  one  will  be  tempted  to  undertake  the  life  of  a  chevalier 
dHndustrie  by  reading  the  book,  or  be  made  to  think  that 
cheating  at  cards  is  either  an  agreeable  or  a  profitable  pro- 
fession. The  following  is  excellent  as  a  tirade  in  favour 
of  gambling,  coming  from  Redmond  de  Balibari,  as  he 
came  to  be  called  during  his  adventures  abroad,  but  it  will 
hardly  persuade  anyone  to  be  a  gambler  : 

"We  always  played  on  parole  with  anybody — any  per- 
son, that  is,  of  honour  and  noble  lineage.  We  never  press- 
ed for  our  winnings,  or  declined  to  receive  promissory 
notes  in  lieu  of  gold.  But  woe  to  the  man  who  did  not 
pay  when  the  note  became  due !  Redmond  de  Balibari 
was  sure  to  wait  upon  him  -with  his  bill,  and  I  promise 
you  there  were  very  few  bad  debts.  On  the  contrary, 
gentlemen  were  grateful  to  us  for  our  forbearance,  and  our 
character  for  honour  stood  unimpeached.  In  latter  times, 
a  vulgar  national  prejudice  has  chosen  to  cast  a  slur  upon 
the  character  of  men  of  honour  engaged  in  the  profession 
of  play ;  but  I  speak  of  the  good  old  days  of  Europe, 
before  the  cowardice  of  the  French  aristocracy  (in  the 
shameful  revolution,  which  served  them  right)  brought 
discredit  upon  our  order.  They  cry  fie  now  upon  men 
engaged  in  play ;  but  I  should  like  to  know  how  much 
more  honourable  their  modes  of  livelihood  are  than  ours. 
The  broker  of  the  Exchange,  who  bulls  and  bears,  and 
buys  and  sells,  and  dabbles  with  lying  loans,  and  trader 
upon  state-secrets — what  is  he  but  a  gamester?  The  mer^ 
chant  who  deals  in  teas  and  tallow,  is  he  any  better?  Ilis 
bales  of  dirty  indigo  are  his  dice,  his  cards  come  up  every 
year  instead  of  every  ten  minutes,  and  the  sea  is  his  green- 
table.     You  call  the  profession  of  the  law  an  honourable 


11.]  FRASER'S  MAGAZINE  AND  PUNCH.  ^3 

one,  where  a  man  will  lie  for  any  bidder — lie  down  pover- 
ty for  the  sake  of  a  fee  from  wealth ;  lie  down  right  be- 
cause wrong  is  in  his  brief.  You  call  a  doctor  an  honour- 
able man — a  swindling  quack  who  does  not  believe  in  the 
nostrums  which  he  prescribes,  and  takes  your  guinea  for 
whispering  in  your  ear  that  it  is  a  fine  morning.  And 
yet,  forsooth,  a  gallant  man,  who  sits  him  down  before  the 
baize  and  challenges  all  comers,  his  money  against  theirs, 
his  fortune  against  theirs,  is  proscribed  by  your  modern 
moral  world!  It  is  a  conspiracy  of  the  middle -class 
against  gentlemen.  It  is  only  the  shopkeeper  cant  which 
is  to  go  down  nowadays.  I  say  that  play  was  an  institu- 
tion of  chivalry.  It  has  been  wrecked  along  with  other 
privileges  of  men  of  birth.  When  Seingalt  engaged  a 
man  for  six-and-thirty  hours  without  leaving  the  table,  do 
you  think  he  showed  no  courage  ?  How  have  we  had  the 
best  blood,  and  the  brightest  eyes  too,  of  Europe  throbbing 
round  the  table,  as  I  and  my  uncle  have  held  the  cards 
and  the  bank  against  some  terrible  player,  who  was  match- 
ing some  thousands  out  of  his  millions  against  our  all, 
which  was  there  on  the  baize !  When  we  enofaofed  that 
daring  Alexis  Kossloffsky,  and  won  seven  thousand  louis 
on  a  single  coup,  had  we  lost  we  should  have  been  beggars 
the  next  day ;  when  he  lost,  he  was  only  a  village  and  a 
few  hundred  serfs  in  pawn  the  worse.  When  at  Toeplitz 
the  Duke  of  Courland  brought  foiirteen  lacqueys,  each 
with  four  bags  of  florins,  and  challenged  our  bank  to  play 
against  the  sealed  bags,  what  did  we  ask  ?  *  Sir,'  said  we, 
'  we  have  but  eighty  thousand  florins  in  bank,  or  two  hun- 
dred thousand  at  three  months.  If  your  highness's  bags 
do  not  contain  more  than  eighty  thousand  we  will  meet 
you.'  And  we  did ;  and  after  eleven  hours'  play,  in  which 
our  bank  was  at  one  time  reduced  to  two  hundred  and 

4* 


V4  THACKERAY.  fcHAP. 

tliree  ducats,  we  won  seventeen  thousand  florins  of  him. 
Is  this  not  something  like  boldness?  Docs  this  profession 
not  require  skill,  and  perseverance,  and  bravery?  Four 
crowned  heads  looked  on  at  the  game,  and  an  imperial 
princess,  when  I  turned  up  the  ace  of  hearts  and  made 
Paroli,  burst  into  tears.  No  man  on  the  European  Conti- 
nent held  a  higher  position  than  Redmond  Barry  then ; 
and  when  the  Duke  of  Courland  lost,  he  was  pleased  to 
say  that  we  had  won  nobly.  And  so  we  had,  and  spent 
nobly  what  we  won."  This  is  very  grand,  and  is  put  as 
an  eloquent  man  would  put  it  who  really  wished  to  defend 
gambling. 

The  rascal,  of  course,  comes  to  a  miserable  end,  but  the 
tone  of  the  narrative  is  continued  throughout.  He  is 
brought  to  live  at  last  with  his  old  mother  in  the  Fleet 
prison,  on  a  wretched  annuity  of  fifty  pounds  per  annum, 
which  she  has  saved  out  of  the  general  wreck,  and  there 
he  dies  of  delirium  tremens.  For  an  assumed  tone  of  con- 
tinued irony,  maintained  through  the  long  memoir  of  a 
life,  never  becoming  tedious,  never  unnatural,  astounding 
us  rather  by  its  naturalness,  I  know  nothing  equal  to  Bar- 
ry Lyndon. 

As  one  reads,  one  sometimes  is  struck  by  a  conviction 
that  this  or  the  other  writer  has  thorouglily  liked  the  work 
on  which  he  is  engaged.  There  is  a  gusto  about  his 
passages,  a  liveliness*  in  the  language,  a  spring  in  the  mo- 
tion of  the  words,  an  eagerness  of  description,  a  lilt,  if  I 
may  so  call  it,  in  the  progress  of  the  narrative,  which 
makes  the  reader  feel  that  the  author  has  himself  greatly 
enjoyed  what  he  has  written.  He  has  evidently  gone  on 
with  his  work  without  any  sense  of  weariness  or  doubt ; 
and  the  words  have  come  readily  to  him.  So  it  has  been 
with  Barry  Lyndon.     "My  mind  was  filled  full  with  those 


n.]  FRASER'S  MAGAZINE  AND  PUNCH.  75 

blackguards,"  Thackeray  once  said  to  a  friend.  It  is  easy 
enough  to  see  that  it  was  so.  In  the  passage  which  I 
have  above  quoted,  his  mind  was  running  over  with  the 
idea  that  a  rascal  might  be  so  far  gone  in  rascality  as  to 
be  in  love  with  his  own  trade. 

This  was  the  last  of  Thackeray's  long  stories  in  Fraser. 
I  have  given  by  no  means  a  complete  catalogue  of  his 
contributions  to  the  magazine,  but  I  have  perhaps  men- 
tioned those  which  are  best  known.  There  were  many 
short  pieces  which  have  now  been  collected  in  his  works, 
such  as  Little  Travels  and  Roadside  Sketches^  and  the  Car- 
men Lilliense,  in  which  the  poet  is  supposed  to  be  detain- 
ed at  Lille  by  want  of  money.  There  are  others  which  I 
think  are  not  to  be  found  in  the  collected  works,  such  as  a 
£ox  of  Novels  hy  Titmarsh,  and  Titmarsh  in  the  Picture 
Galleries.  After  the  name  of  Titmarsh  had  been  once  as- 
sumed it  was  generally  used  in  the  papers  which  he  sent 
to  Fraser. 

Thackeray's  connection  vs\i\\  Punch  began  in  1843,  and, 
as  far  as  I  can  learn.  Miss  Tlckletobif  s  Lectures  on  English 
History  was  his  first  contribution.  They,  however,  have 
not  been  found  worthy  of  a  place  in  the  collected  edition. 
His  short  pieces  during  a  long  period  of  his  life  were  so 
numerous  that  to  have  brouo-ht  them  all  tog-ether  would 
have  weighted  his  more  important  works  with  too  great 
an  amount  of  extraneous  matter.  The  same  lady,  Miss 
Tickletoby,  gave  a  series  of  lectures.  There  was  The  His- 
tory of  the  next  French  Revolution^  and  The  Wanderings 
of  our  Fat  Contributor  —  the  first  of  which  is,  and  the 
latter  is  not,  perpetuated  in  his  works.  Our  old  friend 
Jeames  Yellowplush,  or  De  la  Pluche — for  we  cannot  for 
a  moment  doubt  that  he  is  the  same  Jeames — is  very  pro- 
lific, and  as  excellent  in  his  orthography,  his  sense,  and 


76  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

satire,  as  ever.  These  papers  began  witli  The  Lucky  Spec- 
ulator. He  lives  in  The  Albany ;  he  hires  a  brougham  ; 
and  is  devoted  to  Miss  Emily  Flimsey,  the  daughter  of  Sir 
George,  "who  had  been  his  master — to  the  great  injury  of 
poor  Maryanne,  the  fellow-servant  who  had  loved  him  in 
his  kitchen  days.  Then  there  follows  that  wonderful  bal- 
lad, Jeames  of  Baclcley  Square.  Upon  this  he  writes  an 
angry  letter  to  Punch,  dated  from  his  chambers  in  The 
Albany :  "  Has  a  reglar  suscriber  to  your  amusing  paper, 
I  beg  leaf  to  state  that  1  should  never  have  done  so  had  I 
supposed  that  it  was  your  'abbit  to  igsposc  the  mistaries 
of  privit  life,  and  to  hinger  the  delligit  feelings  of  umble 
individyouls  like  myself."  He  writes  in  his  own  defence, 
both  as  to  Maryanne  and  to  the  share-dealing  by  which  he 
had  made  his  fortune;  and  he  ends  with  declaring  his 
right  to  the  position  which  he  holds.  "You  are  corrict 
in  stating  that  I  am  of  hancient  Normin  fam'ly.  This  is 
more  than  Peal  can  say,  to  whomb  I  applied  for  a  bar- 
netcy;  but  the  primmier  being  of  low  igstraction,  natrally 
stikles  for  his  border."  And  the  letter  is  signed  "  Fitz- 
james  De  la  Pluche."  Then  follows  his  diary,  beginning 
with  a  description  of  the  way  in  which  he  rushed  into 
Punches  office,  declaring  his  misfortunes,  when  losses  had 
come  upon  him.  "  I  wish  to  be  paid  for  my  contribew- 
tions  to  your  paper.  Suckmstances  is  altered  with  me." 
Whereupon  he  gets  a  cheque  upon  Messrs.  Pump  and  Aid- 
gate,  and  has  himself  carried  away  to  new  speculations. 
lie  leaves  his  diary  behind  him,  and  Punch  surreptitiously 
publishes  it.  There  is  much  in  the  diary  \Thich  comes 
from  Thackeray's  very  heart.  Who  docs  not  remember 
his  indignation  against  Lord  Bareacres ?  "I  gave  the  old 
humbug  a  few  shares  out  of  my  own  pocket.  'There,  old 
Pride,'  says  I, '  I  like  to  sec  you  down  on  your  knees  to  a 


n.]  FRASER'S  MAGAZINE  AND  PUNCH.  11 

footman.  There,  old  Pomposity !  Take  fifty  pounds.  I 
like  to  see  you  come  cringing  and  begging  for  it !'  AVhen- 
ever  I  see  him  in  a  very  public  place,  I  take  my  change 
for  my  money.  I  digg  him  in  the  ribbs,  or  clap  his  pad- 
ded old  shouldei's.  I  call  him  '  Bareacres,  my  old  brick,' 
and  I  see  him  wince.  It  does  my  'art  good."  It  docs 
Thackeray's  heart  good  to  pour  himself  out  in  indignation 
against  some  imaginary  Bareacres.  He  blows  off  his 
steam  with  such  an  eagerness  that  he  forgets  for  a  time,  or 
nearly  forgets,  his  cacography.  Then  there  are  "  Jeames 
on  Time  Bargings,"  "Jeames  on  the  Guage  Question," 
"  Mr.  Jearaes  ao;ain."  Of  all  our  author's  heroes  Jeames 
is  perhaps  the  most  amusing.  There  is  not  much  in  that 
joke  of  bad  spelling,  and  we  should  have  been  inclined  to 
say  beforehand,  that  Mrs.  Malaprop  had  done  it  so  well 
and  so  sufficiently,  that  no  repetition  of  it  would  be  re- 
ceived with  great  favour.  Like  other  dishes,  it  depends 
upon  the  cooking.  Jeames,  with  his  "suckmstances,"  high 
or  low,  will  be  immortal. 

There  were  The  Travels  in  London,  a  long  series  of 
them ;  and  then  PuncKs  Prize  Novelists,  in  which  Thack- 
eray imitates  the  language  and  plots  of  Bulwer,  Disraeli, 
Charles  Lever,  G.  P.  R.  James,  Mrs.  Gore,  and  Cooper,  the 
American.  They  are  all  excellent ;  perhaps  Codlingsby  is 
the  best.  Mendoza,  when  he  is  fighting  with  the  barge- 
man, or  drinking  with  Codlingsby,  or  receiving  Louis 
Philippe  in  his  rooms,  seems  to  have  come  direct  from 
the  pen  of  our  Premier.  Phil  Fogerty's  jump,  and  the 
younger  and  the  elder  horsemen,  as  they  come  riding  into 
the  story,  one  in  his  armour  and  the  other  with  his  feathers, 
have  the  very  savour  and  tone  of  Lever  and  James ;  but 
then  the  savour  and  the  tone  are  not  so  piquant.  I  know 
nothing  in  the  way  of  imitation  to  equal  Codlingsby,  if  it 


IS  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

be  not  The  Tale  of  Dniry  Lane,  by  W.  S.  in  the  Rejected 
Addresses,  of  which  it  is  said  that  Walter  Scott  declared 
that  he  must  have  written  it  himself.  The  scene  between 
Dr.  Franklin,  Louis  XVI.,  Marie  Antoinette,  and  Tatua, 
the  chief  of  the  Nose -rings,  as  told  in  The  Stars  and 
Stripes,  is  perfect  in  its  way,  but  it  fails  as  being  a  carica- 
ture of  Cooper.  The  caricaturist  has  been  carried  away 
beyond  and  above  his  model,  by  his  own  sense  of  fun. 

Of  the  ballads  which  appeared  in  Punch  I  will  speak 
elsewhere,  as  I  must  give  a  separate  short  chapter  to  our 
author's  power  of  versification ;  but  I  must  say  a  word  of 
The  Snob  Papers,  which  were  at  the  time  the  most  popu- 
lar and  the  best  known  of  all  Thackeray's  contributions  to 
Pu7ich.  I  think  that  perhaps  they  were  more  charming, 
more  piquant,  more  apparently  true,  when  they  came  out 
one  after  another  in  the  periodical,  than  they  are  now  as 
collected  too-ether.  I  think  that  one  at  a  time  would  be 
better  than  many.  And  I  think  that  the  first  half  in  the 
long  list  of  snobs  would  have  been  more  manifestly  snobs 
to  us  than  they  are  now  with  the  second  half  of  the  list 
appended.  In  fact,  there  are  too  many  of  them,  till  the 
reader  is  driven  to  tell  himself  that  the  meaning  of  it  all 
is  that  Adam's  family  is  from  first  to  last  a  family  of 
snobs.  "  First,"  says  Thackeray,  in  preface,  "  the  world 
was  made ;  then,  as  a  matter  of  course,  snobs ;  they  exist- 
ed for  years  and  years,  and  were  no  more  known  than 
America.  But  presently — ingens  patebat  tellus — the  peo- 
ple became  darkly  aware  that  there  was  such  a  race.  Not 
above  five-and-twenty  years  since,  a  name,  an  expressive 
monosyllable,  arose  to  designate  that  case.  That  name 
has  spread  over  England  like  railroads  subsequently ;  snobs 
are  known  and  recognised  throughout  an  empire  on  which 
I  am  given  to  understand  the  sun  never  sets.     Punch  ap- 


II.]  FRASER'S  MAGAZINE  AND  PUNCH.  79 

pears  at  the  right  season  to  chronicle  their  history ;  and 
the  individual  comes  forth  to  write  that  history  in  Punch. 

"  I  have — and  for  this  gift  I  congratulate  myself  with 
a  deep  and  abiding  thankfulness — an  eye  for  a  snob.  If 
the  truthful  is  the  beautiful,  it  is  beautiful  to  study  even 
the  snobbish — to  track  snobs  through  history  as  certain 
little  dogs  in  Hampshire  hunt  out  truffles ;  to  sink  shafts 
in  society,  and  come  upon  rich  veins  of  snob-ore.  Snob- 
bishness is  like  Death,  in  a  quotation  from  Horace,  which 
I  hope  you  never  heard,  '  beating  with  equal  foot  at  poor 
men's  doors,  and  kicking  at  the  gates  of  emperors.'  It  is 
a  great  mistake  to  judge  of  snobs  lightly,  and  think  they 
exist  among  the  lower  classes  merely.  An  immense  per- 
centage of  snobs,  I  believe,  is  to  be  found  in  every  rank  of 
this  mortal  life.  You  must  not  judge  hastily  or  vulgarly 
of  snobs ;  to  do  so  shows  that  you  are  yourself  a  snob.  I 
myself  have  been  taken  for  one." 

The  state  of  Thackeray's  mind  when  he  commenced 
his  delineations  of  snobbery  is  here  accurately  depicted. 
Written,  as  these  papers  were,  for  Punch,  and  written,  as 
they  were,  by  Thackeray,  it  was  a  necessity  that  every 
idea  put  forth  should  be  given  as  a  joke,  and  that  the 
satire  on  society  in  general  should  be  wrapped  up  in  bur- 
lesque absurdity.  But  not  the  less  eager  and  serious  was 
his  intention.  When  he  tells  us,  at  the  end  of  the  first 
chapter,  of  a  certain  Colonel  Snobley,  whom  he  met  at 
"  Bagnigge  Wells,"  as  he  says,  and  with  whom  he  was  so 
disgusted  that  he  determined  to  drive  the  man  out  of  the 
house,  we  are  well  aware  that  he  had  met  an  offensive 
military  gentleman — probably  at  Tunbridge.  Gentlemen 
thus  offensive,  even  though  tamely  offensive,  were  peculiar- 
ly offensive  to  him.  AVe  presume,  by  what  follows,  that 
this  gentleman,  ignorantly — for  himself  most  unfortunate- 


80  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

]y — spoke  of  Publicola.  Thacteray  was  disgusted — dis- 
gusted that  such  a  name  should  be  lugged  into  ordinary 
conversation  at  all,  and  then  that  a  man  should  talk  about 
a  name  with  which  he  was  so  little  acquainted  as  not  to 
know  how  to  pronounce  it.  The  man  was  therefore  a 
snob,  and  ought  to  be  put  down  ;  in  all  which  I  think  that 
Thackeray  was  unnecessarily  hard  on  the  man,  and  gave 
him  too  much  importance. 

So  it  was  with  him  in  his  whole  intercourse  with  snobs 
— as  he  calls  them.  He  saw  something  that  was  distaste- 
ful, and  a  man  instantly  became  a  snob  in  his  estimation. 
"  But  you  can  draw,"  a  man  once  said  to  him,  there  hav- 
ing been  some  discussion  on  the  subject  of  Thackeray's 
art  powers.  The  man  meant  no  doubt  to  be  civil,  but 
meant  also  to  imply  that  for  the  purpose  needed  the 
drawing  was  good  enough  —  a  matter  on  which  he  was 
competent  to  form  an  opinion.  Thackeray  instantly  put 
the  man  down  as  a  snob  for  flattering  him.  The  little 
courtesies  of  the  world  and  the  little  discourtesies  became 
snobbish  to  him.  A  man  could  not  wear  his  hat,  or  carry 
his  umbrella,  or  mount  his  horse,  without  falling  into  some 
error  of  snobbism  before  his  hypercritical  eyes.  St.  Mi- 
chael would  have  carried  his  armour  amiss,  and  St.  Cecilia 
have  been  snobbish  as  she  twanged  her  harp. 

I  fancy  that  a  policeman  considers  that  every  man  in 
the  street  would  be  properly  "  run  in,"  if  only  all  the  truth 
about  the  man  had  been  known.  The  tinker  thinks  that 
every  pot  is  unsound.  The  cobbler  doubts  the  stability 
of  every  shoe.  So  at  last  it  grew  to  be  the  case  with 
Thackeray.  There  was  more  hope  that  the  city  should 
be  saved  because  of  its  ten  just  men,  than  for  society,  if 
society  were  to  depend  on  ten  who  were  not  snobs.  All 
this  arose  from  the  keenness  of  his  vision  into  that  which 


11.]  FRASER'S  MAGAZINE  AND  PUXCn.  81 

was  really  mean.  But  that  keenness  became  so  aggravated 
by  the  intenseness  of  his  search  that  the  slightest  speck 
of  dust  became  to  his  eyes  as  a  foul  stain.  Publicola,  as 
we  saw,  damned  one  poor  man  to  a  wretched  immortality, 
and  another  was  called  pitilessly  over  the  coals  because 
he  had  mixed  a  grain  of  flattery  with  a  bushel  of  truth. 
Thackeray  tells  us  that  he  was  born  to  hunt  out  snobs,  as 
certain  do2:s  are  trained  to  find  triifiles.  But  we  can  im- 
agine  that  a  dog,  very  energetic  at  producing  truffles,  and 
not  finding  them  as  plentiful  as  his  heart  desired,  might 
occasionally  produce  roots  which  w^ere  not  genuine — might 
be  carried  on  in  his  energies  till  to  his  senses  every  fungus- 
root  became  a  truffle.  I  think  that  there  has  been  some- 
thing of  this  with  our  author's  snob-hunting,  and  that  his 
zeal  was  at  last  greater  than  his  discrimination. 

The  nature  of  the  task  which  came  upon  him  made  this 
fault  almost  unavoidable.  When  a  hit  is  made,  say  with 
a  piece  at  a  theatre,  or  with  a  set  of  illustrations,  or  with 
a  series  of  papers  on  this  or  the  other  subject  —  when 
something  of  this  kind  has  suited  the  taste  of  the  mo- 
ment, and  gratified  the  public,  there  is  a  natural  inclina- 
tion on  the  part  of  those  w^ho  are  interested  to  continue 
that  which  has  been  found  to  be  good.  It  pays  and  it 
pleases,  and  it  seems  to  suit  everybody.  Then  it  is  con- 
tinued usque  ad  nauseam.  We  see  it  in  everything.  When 
the  king  said  he  liked  partridges,  partridges  were  served 
to  him  every  day.  The  world  was  pleased  with  certain 
ridiculous  portraits  of  its  big  men.  The  big  men  were 
soon  used  up,  and  the  little  men  had  to  be  added. 

We  can  imagine  that  even  Punch  may  occasionally  be 
at  a  loss  for  subjects  wherewith  to  delight  its  readers.  In 
fact.  The  Snob  Papers  were  too  good  to  be  brought  to  an 
end,  and  therefore  there  were  forty-five  of  them.    A  dozen 


82  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

would  have  been  better.  As  he  himself  says  in  his  last 
paper,  "  for  a  mortal  year  we  have  been  together  flattering 
and  abusing  the  human  race."  It  was  exactly  that.  Of 
course  we  know — everybody  always  knows — that  a  bad 
specimen  of  his  order  may  be  found  in  every  division  of 
society.  There  may  be  a  snob  king,  a  snob  parson,  a 
snob  member  of  parliament,  a  snob  grocer,  tailor,  gold- 
smith, and  the  like.  But  that  is  not  what  has  been  meant. 
We  did  not  want  a  special  satirist  to  tell  us  what  we  all 
knew  before.  Had  snobbishness  been  divided  for  us  into 
its  various  attributes  and  characteristics,  rather  than  at- 
tributed to  various  classes,  the  end  sought — the  exposure, 
namely,  of  the  evil  —  would  have  been  better  attained. 
The  snobbishness  of  flattery,  of  falsehood,  of  cowardice, 
lying,  time-serving,  money-worship,  would  have  been  per- 
haps attacked  to  a  better  purpose  than  that  of  kings, 
priests,  soldiers,  merchants,  or  men  of  letters.  The  assault 
as  made  by  Thackeray  seems  to  have  been  made  on  the 
profession  generally. 

The  paper  on  clerical  snobs  is  intended  to  be  essentially 
generous,  and  is  ended  by  an  allusion  to  certain  old  cleri- 
cal friends  which  has  a  sweet  tone  of  tenderness  in  it. 
"  How  should  he  who  knows  you,  not  respect  you  or  your 
calling  ?  May  this  pen  never  write  a  pennyworth  again  if 
it  ever  casts  ridicule  upon  either."  But  in  the  mean  time 
he  has  thrown  his  stone  at  the  covetousness  of  bishops, 
because  of  certain  Irish  prelates  who  died  rich  many  years 
before  he  wrote.  The  insinuation  is  that  bishops  gener- 
ally take  more  of  the  loaves  and  fishes  than  they  ought, 
whereas  the  fact  is  that  bishops'  incomes  arc  generally  so 
insufficient  for  the  requirements  demanded  of  them,  that 
a  feeling  prevails  that  a  clergyman  to  be  fit  for  a  bishop- 
ric  should  have  a  private  income.     He  attacks  the  snob- 


II.]  FRASER'S  MAGAZINE  AND  PUNCH.  83 

bislmess  of  the  universities,  showinq;  us  how  one  class  of 
young  men  consists  of  fellow-commoners,  who  wear  lace 
and  drink  wine  with  their  meals,  and  another  class  con- 
sists of  sizars,  or  servitors,  who  wear  badges,  as  being  poor, 
and  are  never  allowed  to  take  their  food  with  their  fellow- 
students.  That  arrangements  fit  for  past  times  are  not  fit 
for  these  is  true  enough.  Consequently,  they  should  grad- 
ually be  changed,  and  from  day  to  day  are  changed.  But 
there  is  no  snobbishness  in  this.  Was  the  fellow-com- 
moner a  snob  when  he  acted  in  accordance  with  the  cus- 
tom of  his  rank  and  standing?  or  the  sizar  who  accepted 
aid  in  achieving  that  education  which  he  could  not  have 
got  without  it?  or  the  tutor  of  the  college,  who  carried 
out  the  rules  entrusted  to  him  ?  There  are  two  military 
snobs,  Rag  and  Famish.  One  is  a  swindler,  and  the  other 
a  debauched  young  idiot.  No  doubt  they  are  both  snobs, 
and  one  has  been,  while  the  other  is,  an  officer.  But  there 
is,  I  think,  not  an  unfairness  so  much  as  an  absence  of 
intuition,  in  attaching  to  soldiers  especially  two  vices  to 
which  all  classes  are  open.  Rag  was  a  gambling  snob,  and 
Famish  a  drunken  snob ;  but  they  were  not  specially  mill-* 
tary  snobs.  There  is  a  chapter  devoted  to  dinner-giving 
snobs,  in  which  I  think  the  doctrine  laid  down  will  not 
hold  water,  and  therefore  that  the  snobbism  imputed  is 
not  proved.  "  Your  usual  style  of  meal,"  says  the  satirist 
— "  that  is  plenteous,  comfortable,  and  in  its  perfection 
— should  be  that  to  which  you  welcome  your  friends." 
Then  there  is  something  said  about  the  "Brummagem 
plate  pomp,"  and  we  are  told  that  it  is  right  that  dukes 
should  give  grand  dinners,  but  that  we  —  of  the  middle 
class  —  should  entertain  our  friends  with  the  simplicity 
which  is  customary  with  us.  In  all  this  there  is,  I  think, 
a  mistake.      The  duke  gives  a  grand  dinner  because  ho 


84  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

thinks  his  friends  will  like  it;  sitting  down  when  alone 
with  the  duchess,  we  may  suppose,  with  a  retinue  and 
grandeur  less  than  that  which  is  arrayed  for  gala  occa- 
sions. So  is  it  with  Mr.  Jones,  who  is  no  snob  because  he 
provides  a  costly  dinner — if  he  can  afford  it.  He  does  it 
because  he  thinks  his  friends  will  like  it.  It  may  be  that 
the  grand  dinner  is  a  bore — and  that  the  leg  of  mutton, 
with  plenty  of  gravy  and  potatoes  all  hot,  would  be  nicer. 
I  generally  prefer  the  leg  of  mutton  myself.  But  I  do 
not  think  that  snobbery  is  involved  in  the  other.  A  man, 
no  doubt,  may  be  a  snob  in  giving  a  dinner.  I  am  not  a 
snob  because  for  the  occasion  I  eke  out  my  own  dozen 
silver  forks  with  plated  ware ;  but  if  I  make  believe  that 
my  plated  ware  is  true  silver,  then  I  am  a  snob. 

In  that  matter  of  association  with  our  betters — yve  will 
for  the  moment  presume  that  gentlemen  and  ladies  with 
titles  or  great  wealth  are  our  betters — great  and  delicate 
questions  arise  as  to  what  is  snobbery  and  what  is  not,  in 
speaking  of  which  Thackeray  becomes  very  indignant,  and 
explains  the  intensity  of  his  feelings  as  thoroughly  by  a 
charming  little  picture  as  by  his  words.  It  is  a  picture  of 
Queen  Elizabeth  as  she  is  about  to  trample  with  disdain 
on  the  coat  which  that  snob  Raleigh  is  throwing  for  her 
use  on  the  mud  before  her.  This  is  intended  to  typify 
the  low  parasite  nature  of  the  Englishman  which  has 
been  described  in  the  previous  page  or  two.  "And  of 
these  calm  moralists  " — it  matters  not  for  our  present  pur- 
pose who  were  the  moralists  in  question—-"  is  there  one,  I 
wonder,  whose  heart  would  not  throb  with  pleasure  if  he 
could  be  seen  walking  arm-in-arm  with  a  couple  of  dukes 
down  Pall  Mall  ?  No  ;  it  is  impossible,  in  our  condition 
of  society,  not  to  be  sometimes  a  snob."  And  again; 
"  How  should  it  be  otherwise  in  a  country  where  lord- 


n.]  FRASER'S  MAGAZINE  AND  PUNCH.  85 

olatry  is  part  of  our  creed,  and  where  our  children  are 
brought  up  to  respect  the  'Peerage'  as  the  Englishman's 
second  Bible?"  Then  follows  the  wonderfully  graphic 
picture  of  Queen  Elizabeth  and  Raleigh. 

In  all  this  Thackeray  has  been  carried  away  from  the 
truth  by  his  hatred  for  a  certain  meanness  of  which  there 
are  no  doubt  examples  enough.  As  for  Raleigh,  I  think 
we  have  always  sympathised  with  the  young  man,  instead 
of  despising  him,  because  he  felt  on  the  impulse  of  the 
moment  that  nothino-  was  too  jjood  for  the  woman  and 
the  queen  combined.  The  idea  of  getting  something  in 
return  for  his  coat  could  hardly  have  come  so  quick  to 
him  as  that  impulse  in  favour  of  royalty  and  womanhood. 
If  one  of  us  to-day  should  see  the  queen  passing,  would  he 
not  raise  his  hat,  and  assume,  unconsciously,  something  of 
an  altered  demeanour  because  of  his  reverence  for  majesty? 
In  doing  so  he  would  have  no  mean  desire  of  getting  any- 
thing. The  throne  and  its  occupant  are  to  him  honourable, 
and  he  honours  them.  There  is  surely  no  greater  mistake 
than  to  suppose  that  reverence  is  snobbishness.  I  meet  a 
great  man  in  the  street,  and  some  chance  having  brought 
me  to  his  knowledge,  he  stops  and  says  a  word  to  me. 
Am  I  a  snob  because  I  feel  myself  to  be  graced  by  his  no- 
tice? Surely  not.  And  if  his  acquaintance  goes  further 
and  he  asks  me  to  dinner,  am  I  not  entitled  so  far  to  think 
well  of  myself  because  I  have  been  found  worthy  of  his 
society  ? 

They  who  have  raised  themselves  in  the  world,  and 
they,  too,  whose  position  has  enabled  them  to  receive  all 
that  estimation  can  give,  all  that  society  can  furnish,  all 
that  intercourse  with  the  great  can  give,  are  more  likely  to 
be  pleasant  companions  than  they  who  have  been  less  for- 
tunate.    That  picture  of  two  companion  dukes  in  Pall 


86  THACKERAY.  [chae 

Mall  is  too  gorgeous  for  human  eye  to  endure.  A  man 
would  be  scorched  to  cinders  by  so  much  light,  as  he 
would  be  crushed  by  a  sack  of  sovereigns  even  though  he 
might  be  allowed  to  have  them  if  he  could  carry  them 
away.  But  there  can  be  no  doubt  that  a  peer  taken  at 
random  as  a  companion  would  be  preferable  to  a  clerk 
from  a  counting-house  —  taken  at  random.  The  clerk 
might  turn  out  a  scholar  on  your  hands,  and  the  peer  no 
better  than  a  poor  spendthrift;  but  the  chances  are  the 
other  way. 

A  tuft-hunter  is  a  snob,  a  parasite  is  a  snob,  the  man 
who  allows  the  manhood  within  him  to  be  awed  by  a  cor- 
onet is  a  snob.  The  man  who  worships  mere  wealth  is  a 
snob.  But  so  also  is  he  who,  in  fear  lest  he  should  be 
called  a  snob,  is  afraid  to  seek  the  acquaintance — or  if  it 
come  to  speak  of  the  acquaintance — of  those  whose  ac- 
quaintance is  manifestly  desirable.  In  all  this  I  feel  that 
Thackeray  was  carried  beyond  the  truth  by  his  intense  de- 
sire to  put  down  what  is  mean. 

It  is  in  truth  well  for  us  all  to  know  what  constitutes 
snobbism,  and  I  think  that  Thackeray,  had  he  not  been 
driven  to  dilution  and  dilatation,  could  have  told  us.  If 
you  will  keep  your  hands  from  picking  and  stealing,  and 
your  tongue  from  evil  speaking,  lying,  and  slandering,  you 
will  not  be  a  snob.  The  lesson  seems  to  be  simple,  and 
perhaps  a  little  trite,  but  if  you  look  into  it,  it  will  be 
found  to  contain  nearly  all  that  is  necessary. 

But  the  excellence  of  each  individual  picture  as  it  is 
drawn  is  not  the  less  striking  because  there  may  be  found 
some  fault  with  the  series  as  a  whole.  What  can  excel 
the  telling  of  the  story  of  Captain  Shindy  at  his  club — 
which  is,  I  must  own,  as  true  as  it  is  graphic  ?  Captain 
Shindy  is  a  real  snob.     " '  Look  at  it,  sir ;  is  it  cooked  ? 


ii.j  FRASER'S  MAGAZINE  AND  PUNCH.  87 

Smell  it,  sir.  Is  it  meat  fit  for  a  gentleman  V  he  roars  out 
to  the  steward,  who  stands  trembling  before  him,  and  who 
in  vain  tells  him  that  the  Bishop  of  Bullocksmithy  has 
jnst  had  three  from  the  same  loin."  The  telling  as  re- 
gards Captain  Shindy  is  excellent,  but  the  sidelong  at- 
tack upon  the  episcopate  is  cruel.  "All  the  waiters  in  the 
club  are  huddled  round  the  captain's  mutton-chop.  He 
roars  out  the  most  horrible  curses  at  John  for  not  bring- 
ing the  pickles.  He  utters  the  most  dreadful  oaths  be- 
cause Thomas  has  not  arrived  with  the  Harvey  sauce. 
Peter  comes  tumbling  with  the  water -jug  over  Jeames, 
who  is  bringing  the  '  glittering  canisters  with  bread.' 
******* 

"  Poor  Mrs.  Shindy  and  the  children  are,  meanwhile,  in 
dingy  lodgings  somewhere,  waited  upon  by  a  charity  girl 
in  pattens." 

The  visit  to  Castle  Carabas,  and  the  housekeeper's  de- 
scription of  the  wonders  of  the  family  mansion,  is  as  good. 
"  *  The  Side  Entrance  and  'All,'  says  the  housekeeper. 
'The  halligator  hover  the  mantelpiece  was  brought  home 
by  Hadmiral  St.  Michaels,  when  a  capting  with  Lord  Han- 
son. The  harms  on  the  cheers  is  the  harms  of  the  Cara- 
bas family.  The  great  'all  is  seventy  feet  in  lenth,  fifty- 
six  in  breath,  and  thirty-eight  feet  'igh.  The  carvings  of 
the  chimlies,  representing  the  buth  of  Venus  and  'Ercules 
and  'Eyelash,  is  by  Van  Chislum,  the  most  famous  sculpt- 
ure of  his  hage  and  country.  The  ceiling,  by  Calimanco, 
represents  Painting,  Harchitecture,  and  Music — the  naked 
female  figure  with  the  barrel-organ — introducing  George, 
first  Lord  Carabas,  to  the  Temple  of  the  Muses.  The  win- 
der ornaments  is  by  Yanderputty.  The  floor  is  Patago- 
nian  marble ;  and  the  chandelier  in  the  centre  was  pre- 
sented to  Lionel,  second  marquis,  by  Lewy  the  Sixteenth, 


88  THACKERAY.  [chap.  ii. 

whose  'ead  was  cut  hoff  in  the  French  Revohition.  We 
now  hcnter  the  South  Gallery,"  etc.,  etc.  All  of  which  is 
very  good  fun,  with  a  dash  of  truth  in  it  also  as  to  the 
snobbery  —  only  in  this  it  will  be  necessary  to  be  quite 
sure  where  the  snobbery  lies.  If  my  Lord  Carabas  has  a 
"  buth  of  Venus,"  beautiful  for  all  eyes  to  see,  there  is  no 
snobbery,  only  good-nature,  in  the  showing  it ;  nor  is  there 
snobbery  in  going  to  see  it,  if  a  beautiful  "  buth  of  Ve- 
nus" has  charms  for  you.  If  you  merely  want  to  see  the 
inside  of  a  lord's  house,  and  the  lord  is  puffed  up  with  the 
pride  of  showing  his,  then  there  will  be  two  snobs. 

Of  all  those  papers  it  may  be  said  that  each  has  that 
quality  of  a  pearl  about  it  which  in  the  previous  chapter 
I  endeavoured  to  explain.  In  each  some  little  point  is 
made  in  excellent  language,  so  as  to  charm  by  its  neatness, 
incision,  and  drollery.  But  The  Snob  Papers  had  better 
be  read  separately,  and  not  taken  in  the  lump. 

Thackeray  ceased  to  write  for  Punch  in  1852,  either  en' 
tirely  or  almost  so. 


CHAPTER  III. 

VANITY    FAIR. 

Something  has  been  said,  in  the  biographical  chapter,  of 
the  way  in  which  Vanity  Fair  was  produced,  and  of  the 
period  in  the  author's  life  in  which  it  w^as  written.  He 
had  become  famous — to  a  limited  extent — by  the  exqui- 
site nature  of  his  contributions  to  periodicals ;  but  he  de- 
sired to  do  something  larger,  something  greater,  some- 
thing, perhaps,  less  ephemeral.  For  though  Barry  Lyn- 
don and  others  have  not  proved  to  be  ephemeral,  it  was 
thus  that  he  regarded  them.  In  this  spirit  he  went  to 
work  and  wrote  Vanity  Fair. 

It  may  be  as  well  to  speak  first  of  the  faults  which 
were  attributed  to  it.  It  was  said  that  the  good  people 
were  all  fools,  and  that  the  clever  people  were  all  knaves. 
When  the  critics — the  talkinsj  critics  as  well  as  the  writ- 
ing  critics — began  to  discuss  Vanity  Fair,  there  had  al- 
ready grown  up  a  feeling  as  to  Thackeray  as  an  author — 
that  he  was  one  who  had  taken  up  the  business  of  castiga- 
ting: the  vices  of  the  world.  Scott  had  dealt  with  the  he- 
roics,  whether  displayed  in  his  Flora  Maclvors  or  Meg 
Merrilieses,  in  his  Ivanhoes  or  Ochil trees.  Miss  Edge- 
worth  had  been  moral ;  Miss  Austen  conventional ;  Bulwer 
had  been  poetical  and  sentimental ;  Marryatt  and  Lever 
had  been  funny  and  pugnacious,  always  with  a  dash  of 

5 


90  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

gallantry,  displaying  funny  naval  and  funny  military  life ; 
and  Dickens  had  already  become  great  in  painting  the 
virtues  of  the  lower  orders.  But  by  all  these  some  kind 
of  virtue  had  been  sung,  though  it  might  be  only  the  vir- 
tue of  riding  a  horse  or  fighting  a  duel.  Even  Eugene 
Aram  and  Jack  Sheppard,  with  whom  Thackeray  found  so 
much  fault,  were  intended  to  be  fine  fellows,  though  they 
broke  into  houses  and  committed  murders.  The  primary 
object  of  all  those  writers  was  to  create  an  interest  by  ex- 
citing sympathy.  To  enhance  our  sympathy  personages 
were  introduced  who  were  very  vile  indeed — as  Bucklaw, 
in  the  guise  of  a  lover,  to  heighten  our  feelings  for  Ra- 
venswood  and  Lucy ;  as  Wild,  as  a  thief-taker,  to  make  us 
more  anxious  for  the  saving  of  Jack ;  as  Ralph  Nickleby, 
to  pile  up  the  pity  for  his  niece  Kate.  But  each  of  these 
novelists  might  have  appropriately  begun  with  an  Arma 
virumque  cano.  The  song  was  to  be  of  something  god- 
like— even  with  a  Peter  Simple.  With  Thackeray  it  had 
been  altogether  different.  Alas,  alas !  the  meanness  of 
human  wishes ;  the  poorness  of  human  results  !  That  had 
been  his  tone.  There  can  be  no  doubt  that  the  heroic 
had  appeared  contemptible  to  him,  as  being  untrue.  The 
girl  who  had  deceived  her  papa  and  mamma  seemed  more 
probable  to  him  than  she  who  perished  under  the  willow- 
tree  from  sheer  love — as  given  in  the  last  chapter.  Why 
sing  songs  that  are  false  ?  Why  tell  of  Lucy  Ashtons  and 
Kate  Nicklebys,  when  pretty  girls,  let  them  be  ever  so 
beautiful,  can  be  silly  and  sly  ?  Why  pour  philosophy  out 
of  the  mouth  of  a  fashionable  young  gentleman  like  Pel- 
ham,  seeing  that  young  gentlemen  of  that  sort  rarely,  or 
we  may  say  never,  talk  after  that  fashion  ?  Why  make  a 
house-breaker  a  gallant  charming  young  fellow,  the  truth 
being  that  house-breakers  as  a  rule  are  as  objectionable  iu 


fii.]  VANITY  FAIR.  'Ji 

their  manners  as  tliey  are  in  their  morals?  Thackeray's 
mind  had  in  truth  worked  in  this  way,  and  he  had  become 
a  satirist.  That  had  been  all  very  well  for  Fraser  and 
Punch  ;  but  when  his  satire  was  continued  through  a  long 
novel,  in  twenty-four  parts,  readers — who  do  in  truth  like 
the  heroic  better  than  the  wicked — began  to  declare  that 
khis  writer  was  no  novelist,  but  only  a  cynic. 

Thence  the  question  arises  what  a  novel  should  be — 
which  I  will  endeavour  to  discuss  very  shortly  in  a  later 
chapter.  But  this  special  fault  was  certainly  found  with 
Vanity  Fair  at  the  time.  Heroines  should  not  only  be 
beautiful,  but  should  be  endowed  also  with  a  quasi  celestial 
grace — grace  of  dignity,  propriety,  and  reticence.  A  her- 
oine should  hardly  want  to  be  married,  the  arrangement 
being  almost  too  mundane  —  and,  should  she  be  brought 
to  consent  to  undergo  such  bond,  because  of  its  acknowl- 
edged utility,  it  should  be  at  some  period  so  distant  as 
hardly  to  present  itself  to  the  mind  as  a  reality.  Eating 
and  drinking  should  be  altogether  indifferent  to  her,  and 
her  clothes  should  be  picturesque  rather  than  smart,  and 
that  from  accident  rather  than  design.  Thackeray's 
Amelia  does  not  at  all  come  up  to  the  description  here 
given.  She  is  proud  of  having  a  lover,  constantly  declar- 
ing to  herself  and  to  others  that  he  is  "  the  greatest  and 
the  best  of  men"  —  whereas  the  young  gentleman  is,  in 
truth,  a  very  little  man.  She  is  not  at  all  indifferent  as  to 
her  finery,  nor,  as  we  see  incidentally,  to  enjoying  her  sup- 
pers at  Vauxhall.  She  is  anxious  to  be  married — and  as 
soon  as  possible.  A  hero,  too,  should  be  dignified  and  of 
a  noble  presence ;  a  man  who,  though  he  may  be  as  poor 
as  Nicholas  Nickleby,  should  nevertheless  be  beautiful  on 
all  occasions,  and  never  deficient  in  readiness,  address,  or 

self-assertion.      Va^Hy  Fair  is  specially  declared  by  the 
G 


92  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

author  to  be  "a  novel  without  a  hero,"  and  therefore  we 
have  hardly  a  right  to  complain  of  deficiency  of  heroic 
conduct  in  any  of  the  male  characters.  But  Captain  Dob- 
bin does  become  the  hero,  and  is  deficient.  Why  was  he 
called  Dobbin,  except  to  make  him  ridiculous?  Why  is 
he  so  shamefully  ugly,  so  shy,  so  awkward  ?  Why  was  he 
Jthe  son  of  a  grocer  ?  Thackeray  in  so  depicting  him  was 
determined  to  run  counter  to  the  recognised  taste  of  novel 
readers.  And  then  again  there  was  the  feeling  of  another 
great  fault.  Let  there  be  the  virtuous  in  a  novel  and  let 
there  be  the  vicious,  the  dignified  and  the  undignified,  the 
sublime  and  the  ridiculous — only  let  the  virtuous,  the  dig- 
nified, and  the  sublime  be  in  the  ascendant.  Edith  Bellen- 
den,  and  Lord  Evandale,  and  Morton  himself  would  be  too 
stilted,  were  they  not  enlivened  by  Mause,  and  Cuddie,  and 
Poundtext.  But  here,  in  this  novel,  the  vicious  and  the 
absurd  have  been  made  to  be  of  more  importance  than  the 
good  and  the  noble.  Becky  Sharp  and  Rawdon  Crawley 
are  the  real  heroine  and  hero  of  the  story.  It  is  with 
them  that  the  reader  is  called  upon  to  interest  himself.  It 
is  of  them  that  he  will  think  when  he  is  reading  the  book. 
It  is  by  them  that  he  will  judge  the  book  when  he  has 
read  it.  There  was  no  doubt  a  feeling  with  the  public 
that  though  satire  may  be  very  well  in  its  place,  it  should 
not  be  made  the  backbone  of  a  work  so  long  and  so  im- 
portant as  this.  A  short  story  such  as  Catherine  or  Barry 
Lyndon  might  be  pronounced  to  have  been  called  for  by 
the  iniquities  of  an  outside  world;  but  this  seemed  to 
the  readers  to  have  been  addressed  almost  to  themselves. 
Now  men  and  women  like  to  be  painted  as  Titian  would 
paint  them,  or  Raffaelle  —  not  as  Rembrandt,  or  even 
Rubens. 

Whether  the  ideal  or  the  real  is  the  best  form  of  a 


III.]  VANITY  FAIR.  93 

novel  may  be  questioned,  but  there  can  be  no  doubt  that 
as  there  are  novelists  who  cannot  descend  from  the  bright 
heaven  of  the  imagination  to  walk  with  their  feet  upon 
the  earth,  so  there  are  others  to  whom  it  is  not  given  to 
soar  among  clouds.  The  reader  must  please  himself,  and 
mate  his  selection  if  he  cannot  enjoy  both.  There  arc 
many  who  are  carried  into  a  heaven  of  pathos  by  the  woes 
of  a  Master  of  Ravenswood,  who  fail  altogether  to  be 
touched  by  the  enduring  constancy  of  a  Dobbin.  There 
are  others  —  and  I  will  not  say  but  they  may  enjoy  the 
keenest  delight  which  literature  can  give  —  who  cannot 
employ  their  minds  on  fiction  unless  it  be  conveyed  in  po- 
etry. With  Thackeray  it  was  essential  that  the  represen- 
tations made  by  him  should  be,  to  his  own  thinking,  life- 
like. A  Dobbin  seemed  to  him  to  be  such  a  one  as  might 
probably  be  met  with  in  the  w^orld,  whereas  to  his  think- 
ing a  Ravenswood  was  simply  a  creature  of  the  imagina- 
tion, lie  would  have  said  of  such,  as  we  would  say  of 
female  faces  by  Raffaelle,  that  women  would  like  to  be 
like  them,  but  are  not  like  them.  Men  might  like  to 
be  like  Ravenswood,  and  women  may  dream  of  men  so 
formed  and  constituted,  but  such  men  do  not  exist.  Dob- 
bins do,  and  therefore  Thackeray  chose  to  write  of  a 
Dobbin. 

So  also  of  the  preference  given  to  Becky  Sharp  and" to 
Rawdon  Crawley.  Thackeray  thought  that  more  can  be 
done  by  exposing  the  vices  than  extolling  the  virtues  of 
mankind.  No  doubt  he  had  a  more  thorough  belief  in 
the  one  than  in  the  other.  The  Dobbins  he  did  encoun- 
ter— seldom  ;  the  Rawdon  Crawleys  very  often.  He  saw 
around  him  so  much  that  was  mean !  lie  was  hurt  so 
often  by  the  little  vanities  of  people !  It  was  thus  that 
be  was  driven  to  that  overthousrhtfulness  about  snobs  of 


94  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

wMcli  I  have  spoken  in  the  last  chapter.  It  thus  became 
natural  to  him  to  insist  on  the  thing  which  he  hated  with 
unceasing  assiduity,  and  only  to  break  out  now  and  again 
into  a  rapture  of  love  for  the  true  nobility  which  was  dear 
to  him — as  he  did  with  the  character  of  Captain  Dobbin. 

It  must  be  added  to  all  this,  that,  before  he  has  done 
with  his  snob  or  his  knave,  he  will  generally  weave  in 
some  little  trait  of  humanity  by  which  the  sinner  shall 
be  relieved  from  the  absolute  darkness  of  utter  iniquity. 
He  deals  with  no  Varneys  or  Deputy-Shepherds,  all  villany 
and  all  lies,  because  the  snobs  and  knaves  he  had  seen  had 
never  been  all  snob  or  all  knave.  Even  Shindy  probably 
had  some  feeling  for  the  poor  woman  he  left  at  home. 
Rawdon  Crawley  loved  his  wicked  wife  dearly,  and  there 
were  moments  even  with  her  in  which  some  redeemins: 
trait  half  reconciles  her  to  the  reader. 

Such  were  the  faults  which  were  found  in  Vanity  Fair ; 
but  though  the  faults  were  found  freely,  the  book  was 
read  by  all.  Those  who  arc  old  enough  can  well  remem- 
ber the  effect  which  it  had,  and  the  welcome  which  was 
given  to  the  different  numbers  as  they  appeared.  Though 
the  story  is  vague  and  wandering,  clearly  commenced  with- 
out any  idea  of  an  ending,  yet  there  is  something  in  the 
telling  which  makes  every  portion  of  it  perfect  in  itself. 
There  are  absurdities  in  it  which  would  not  be  admitted 
to  anyone  who  had  not  a  peculiar  gift  of  making  even 
his  absurdities  delightful.  No  school-girl  who  ever  lived 
would  hai^e  thrown  back  her  gift-book,  as  Rebecca  did  the 
"  dixonarv,"  out  of  the  carriage  window  as  she  was  taken 
away  from  school.  But  who  does  not  love  that  scene 
with  which  the  novel  commences  ?  IIow  could  such  a 
girl  as  Amelia  Osborne  have  got  herself  into  such  society 
as  that  in  which  we  see  her  at  Vauxhall  ?    But  we  forgive 


III.]  VANITY  FAIR.  95 

it  all  because  of  the  telling.     And  then  there  is  that  crown- 
ing absurdity  of  Sir  Pitt  Crawley  and  his  establishment. 

I  never  could  understand  how  Thackeray  in  his  first  se- 
rious attempt  could  have  dared  to  subject  himself  and  Sir 
Pitt  Crawley  to  the  critics  of  the  time.  Sir  Pitt  is  a  bar- 
onet, a  man  of  large  property,  and  in  Parliament,  to  whom 
Becky  Sharp  goes  as  a  governess  at  the  end  of  a  delightful 
visit  with  her  friend  Amelia  Sedley,  on  leaving  Miss  Pink- 
erton's  school.  The  Sedley  carriage  takes  her  to  Sir  Pitt's 
door.  "  When  the  bell  was  rung  a  head  appeared  between 
the  interstices  of  the  dining-room  shutters,  and  the  door 
was  opened  by  a  man  in  drab  breeches  and  gaiters,  with  a 
dirty  old  coat,  a  foul  old  neckcloth  lashed  round  his  bris- 
tly neck,  a  shining  bald  head,  a  leering  red  face,  a  pair 
of  twinkling  gray  eyes,  and  a  mouth  perpetually  on  the 
grin. 

"  '  This  Sir  Pitt  Crawley's  ?'  says  John  from  the  box. 

"  *  E'es,'  says  the  man  at  the  door,  with  a  nod. 

" '  Hand  down  these  'ere  trunks  there,'  said  John. 

"  '  Hand  'em  down  yourself,'  said  the  porter." 
But  John  on  the  box   declines  to  do  this,  as  he  cannot 
leave  his  horses. 

"The  bald-headed  man,  taking  his  hands  out  of  his 
breeches'  pockets,  advanced  on  this  summons,  and  throw- 
ing Miss  Sharp's  trunk  over  his  shoulder,  carried  it  into 
the  house."  Then  Becky  is  shown  into  the  house,  and  a 
dismantled  dining-room  is  described,  into  which  she  is  led 
by  the  dirty  man  with  the  trunk. 

Two  kitchen  chairs,  and  a  round  table,  and  an  attenuated  old  poker 
and  tongs,  were,  however,  gathered  round  the  fireplace,  as  was  a  sauce- 
pan over  a  feeble,  sputtering  fire.  There  was  a  bit  of  cheese  and 
bread  and  a  tin  candlestick  on  the  table,  and  a  little  black  porter  in 
a  pint  pot. 


96  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

"  Had  your  dinner,  I  suppose  ?"  This  was  said  by  him  of  the 
bald  head.     "  It  is  not  too  warm  for  you?     Like  a  drop  of  beer  ?" 

"  Where  is  Sir  Pitt  Crawley  ?"  said  Miss  Sharp,  majestically. 

"  He,  he !  /'m  Sir  Pitt  Crawley.  Rek'lect  you  owe  me  a  pint  for 
bringing  down  your  luggage.     He,  he !  ask  Tinker  if  I  ain't." 

The  lady  addressed  as  Mrs.  Tinker  at  this  moment  made  her  ap- 
pearance, with  a  pipe  and  a  paper  of  tobacco,  for  which  she  had  been 
despatched  a  minute  before  Miss  Sharp's  arrival ;  and  she  handed 
the  articles  over  to  Sir  Pitt,  who  had  taken  his  seat  by  the  fire. 

"Where's  the  farden?"  said  he.  "I  gave  you  three  half -pence; 
Where's  the  change,  old  Tinker?" 

"  There,"  replied  Mrs.  Tinker,  flinging  down  the  coin.  "  It's  only 
baronets  as  cares  about  farthings." 

Sir  Pitt  Crawley  has  always  been  to  me  a  stretch  of  au- 
dacity which  I  have  been  unable  to  understand.  But  it 
has  been  accepted;  and  from  this  commencement  of  Sir 
Pitt  Crawley  have  grown  the  wonderful  characters  of  the 
Crawley  family  —  old  Miss  Crawley,  the  worldly,  wicked, 
pleasure-loving  aunt ;  the  Rev.  Bute  Crawley  and  his  wife, 
who  arc  quite  as  worldly ;  the  sanctimonious  elder  son,  who 
in  truth  is  not  less  so ;  and  Rawdon,  who  ultimately  be- 
comes Becky's  husband — who  is  the  bad  hero  of  the  book, 
as  Dobbin  is  the  good  hero.  They  are  admirable ;  but  it 
is  quite  clear  that  Thackeray  had  known  nothing  of  what 
was  coming  about  them  when  he  caused  Sir  Pitt  to  eat  his 
tripe  with  Mrs.  Tinker  in  the  London  dining-room. 

There  is  a  double  story  running  through  the  book,  the 
parts  of  which  are  but  lightly  woven  together,  of  which 
the  former  tells  us  the  life  and  adventures  of  that  singular 
young  woman,  Becky  Sharp ;  and  the  other  the  troubles 
and  ultimate  success  of  our  noble  hero,  Captain  Dobbin. 
Though  it  be  true  that  readers  prefer,  or  pretend  to  prefer, 
the  romantic  to  the  common  in  their  novels,  and  complain 
of  pages  which  arc  defiled  with  that  which  is  low,  yet  I  find 


III.]  VANITY  FAIR.  97 

that  the  absurd,  the  ludicrous,  and  even  the  evil,  leave  more 
impression  behind  them  than  the  grand,  the  beautiful,  or 
even  the  good.  Dominie  Sampson,  Dugald  Dalgetty,  and 
Bothwell  are,  I  think,  more  remembered  than  Fergus  Mac- 
Ivor,  than  Ivanhoe  himself,  or  Mr.  Butler  the  minister.  It 
certainly  came  to  pass  that,  in  spite  of  the  critics,  Becky 
Sharp  became  the  first  attraction  in  Vanity  Fair.  When 
we  speak  now  of  Vanity  Fair,  it  is  always  to  Becky  that 
our  thoughts  recur.  She  has  made  a  position  for  herself 
in  the  world  of  fiction,  and  is  one  of  our  established  per- 
sonages. 

I  have  already  said  how  she  left  school,  throwing  the 
"  dixonary  "  out  of  the  window,  like  dust  from  her  feet, 
and  was  taken  to  spend  a  few  halcyon  weeks  with  her 
friend  Amelia  Sedley,  at  the  Sedley  mansion  in  Russell 
Square.  There  she  meets  a  brother  Sedley  home  from  In- 
dia— the  immortal  Jos — at  whom  she  began  to  set  her 
hitherto  untried  cap.  Here  we  become  acquainted  both 
with  the  Sedley  and  with  the  Osborne  families,  with  ail 
their  domestic  affections  and  domestic  snobbery,  and  have 
to  confess  that  the  snobbery  is  stronger  than  the  affection. 
As  we  desire  to  love  Amelia  Sedley,  we  wish  that  the  peo- 
ple around  her  were  less  vulgar  or  less  selfish — especially 
we  wish  it  in  regard  to  that  handsome  young  fellow,  George 
Osborne,  whom  she  loves  with  her  whole  heart.  But  with 
Jos  Sedley  we  are  inclined  to  be  content,  though  he  be  fat, 
purse-proud,  awkward,  a  drunkard,  and  a  coward,  because 
we  do  not  want  anything  better  for  Becky.  Becky  does 
not  want  anything  better  for  herself,  because  the  man  has 
money.  She  has  been  born  a  pauper.  She  knows  herself 
to  be  but  ill  qualified  to  set  up  as  a  beauty  —  though  by 
dint  of  cleverness  she  does  succeed  in  that  afterwards. 
She  has  no  advantages  in  regard  to  friends  or  family  as 

5* 


98  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

she  enters  life.  She  must  earn  her  bread  for  herself. 
Young  as  she  is,  she  loves  money,  and  has  a  great  idea  of 
the  power  of  money.  Therefore,  though  Jos  is  distasteful 
at  all  points,  she  instantly  makes  her  attack.  She  fails, 
however,  at  any  rate  for  the  present.  She  never  becomes 
his  wife,  but  at  last  she  succeeds  in  getting  some  of  his 
money.  But  before  that  time  comes  she  has  many  a  suf- 
fering to  endure,  and  many  a  triumph  to  enjoy. 

She  goes  to  Sir  Pitt  Crawley  as  governess  for  his  sec- 
ond family,  and  is  taken  down  to  Queen's  Crawley  in  the 
country.  There  her  cleverness  prevails,  even  with  the 
baronet,  of  whom  I  have  just  given  Thackeray's  portrait. 
She  keeps  his  accounts,  and  writes  his  letters,  and  helps 
him  to  save  money ;  she  reads  with  the  elder  sister  books 
they  ought  not  to  have  read ;  she  flatters  the  sanctimoni- 
ouc  son.  In  point  of  fact,  she  becomes  all  in  all  at  Queen's 
Crawley,  so  that  Sir  Pitt  himself  falls  in  love  Avith  her — 
for  there  is  reason  to  think  that  Sir  Pitt  may  soon  be- 
come again  a  widower.  But  there  also  came  down  to  the 
baronet's  house,  on  an  occasion  of  general  entertaining. 
Captain  Kawdon  Crawley.  Of  course  Becky  sets  her  cap 
at  him,  jnd  of  course  succeeds.  She  always  succeeds. 
Though  vhe  is  only  the  governess,  he  insists  upon  dancing 
with  her,  to  the  neglect  of  all  the  young  ladies  of  the 
neighbourhood.  They  continue  to  walk  together  by  moon- 
light—  or  starlight  —  the  great,  heavy,  stupid,  half -tipsy 
dragoon,  and  the  Intriguing,  covetous,  altogether  unprinci- 
pled young  woman,  A.nd  the  two  young  people  absolute- 
ly come  to  love  one  another  in  their  way  —  the  heavy, 
stupid,  fuddled  dragoon,  and  the  false,  covetous,  altogether 
unprincipled  young  woman. 

The  fat  aunt  Crawley  is  a  maiden  lady,  very  rich,  and 
Becky  quite  succeeds  in  gaining  the  rich  aunt  by  her 


III.]  VANITY  FAIR.  99 

wiles.  The  aunt  becomes  so  fond  of  Becky  down  in  the 
country,  that  when  she  has  to  return  to  her  own  house  in 
town,  sick  from  over -eating,  she  cannot  be  happy  with- 
out taking  Becky  with  her.  So  Becky  is  installed  in  the 
house  in  London,  having  been  taken  away  abruptly  from 
her  pupils,  to  the  great  dismay  of  the  old  lady's  long-es- 
tablished resident  companion.  They  all  fall  in  love  with 
her;  she  makes  herself  so  charming, she  is  so  clever;  she 
can  even,  by  help  of  a  little  care  in  dressing,  become  so 
picturesque!  As  all  this  goes  on,  the  reader  feels  what  a 
great  personage  is  Miss  Rebecca  Sharp. 

Lady  Crawley  dies  down  in  the  country,  while  Becky 
is  still  staying  with  his  sister,  who  will  not  part  with  her. 
Sir  Pitt  at  once  rushes  up  to  town,  before  the  funeral, 
looking  for  consolation  where  only  he  can  find  it.  Becky 
brino's  him  down  word  from  his  sister's  room  that  the  old 
lady  is  too  ill  to  see  him. 

"  So  much  the  better,"  Sir  Pitt  answered  . "  I  want  to  see  you, 
Miss  Sharp.  I  want  you  back  at  Queen's  Crawley,  miss,"  the  bar- 
onet said.  His  eyes  had  such  a  strange  look,  and  were  fixed  upon 
her  so  stedfastly  that  Rebecca  Sharp  began  almost  to  tremble.  Then 
she  half  promises,  talks  about  the  dear  children,  and  angles  with  the 
old  man.  "I  tell  you  I  want  you,"  he  says;  "I'm  going  back  to 
the  vuneral,  will  you  come  back  ? — yes  or  no  ?" 

"  I  daren't.  I  don't  think — it  wouldn't  be  right— to  be  alone— 
with  you,  sir,"  Becky  said,  seemingly  in  great  agitation. 

"  I  say  again,  I  want  you.  I  can't  get  on  without  you.  I  didn't 
see  what  it  was  till  you  went  away.  The  house  all  goes  wrong. 
It's  not  the  same  place.  All  my  accounts  has  got  muddled  again. 
You  must  come  back.     Do  come  back.     Dear  Becky,  do  come." 

"Come — as  what, sir?"  Rebecca  gasped  out. 

"  Come  as  Lady  Crawley,  if  you  like.  There,  will  that  zatisfy 
you?  Come  back  and  be  my  wife.  You're  vit  for  it.  Birth  be 
hanged.  You're  as  good  a  lady  as  ever  I  see.  You've  got  more 
brains  in  your  little  vinger  than  any  baronet's  wife  in  the  country. 


100  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

Will  you  come  ?  Yes  or  no  ?"  Rebecca  is  startled,  but  the  old  man 
goes  on.  "  I'll  make  you  happy ;  zee  if  I  don't.  You  shall  do  what 
you  hke,  spend  what  you  like,  and  have  it  all  your  own  way.  I'll 
make  you  a  settlement.  I'll  do  everything  regular.  Look  here,"  and 
the  old  man  fell  down  on  his  knees  and  leered  at  her  like  a  satyr. 

But  Rebecca,  thougli  she  had  been  angling,  angling  for 
favour  and  love  and  power,  had  not  expected  this.  For 
once  in  her  life  she  loses  her  presence  of  mind,  and  ex- 
claims :  "  Oh,  Sir  Pitt ;  oh,  sir ;  I — I'm  married  already  !" 
She  has  married  Rawdon  Crawley,  Sir  Pitt's  younger  son, 
Miss  Crawley's  favourite  among  those  of  her  family  who 
are  looking  for  her  money.  But  she  keeps  her  secret  for 
the  present,  and  writes  a  charming  letter  to  the  Captain : 
"Dearest, —  Something  tells  me  that  we  shall  conquer. 
You  shall  leave  that  odious  regiment.  Quit  gaming,  rac- 
ing, and  be  a  good  boy,  and  we  shall  all  live  in  Park  Lane, 
and  ma  tante  shall  leave  us  all  her  money."  Ma  tante's 
money  has  been  in  her  mind  all  through,  but  yet  she  loves 
him. 

"  Suppose  the  old  lady  doesn't  come  to,"  Rawdon  said  to  his  little 
wife  as  they  sat  together  in  the  snug  little  Brompton  lodgings.  She 
had  been  trying  the  new  piano  all  the  morning.  The  new  gloves 
fitted  her  to  a  nicety.  The  new  shawl  became  her  wonderfully. 
The  new  rings  glittered  on  her  little  hands,  and  the  new  watch  ticked  J  \A 
at  her  waist.  ■.  .VaT 

"/fl  make  your  fortune,"  she  said;  and  Delilah  patted  Samson's  ^^^     v 
cheek-  , 

"You  can  do  anything,"  he  said,  kissing  the  little  hand.  "By 
Jove  you  can!  and  we'll  drive  down  to  the  Star  and  Garter  and 
dine, by  Jove!" 

They  were  neither  of  them  quite  heartless  at  that  mo- 
ment, nor  did  Rawdon  ever  become  quitq.  bad.  Then  fol- 
low the  adventures  of  Becky  as  a  married  woman,  through 


III.]  VANITY  FAIR.  101 

all  of  wliich  there  is  a  glimmer  of  love  for  her  stupid  hus- 
band, while  it  is  the  real  purpose  of  her  heart  to  get  money 
how  she  may — by  her  charms,  by  her  wit,  by  her  lievS,  by 
her  readiness.  She  makes  love  to  everyone — even  to  her 
sanctimonious  brother-in-law,  w^ho  becomes  Sir  Pitt  in  his 
time — and  always  succeeds.  But  in  her  love-making  there 
is  nothing  of  love.  She  gets  hold  of  that  well -remem- 
bered old  reprobate,  the  Marquis  of  Steyne,  who  possesses 
the  two  valuable  gifts  of  being  very  dissolute  and  very 
rich,  and  from  him  she  obtains  money  and  jewels  to  her 
heart's  desire.  The  abominations  of  Lord  Steyne  are  de- 
picted in  the  strongest  language  of  which  Vanity  Fair 
admits.  The  reader's  hair  stands  almost  on  end  in  hor- 
ror at  the  wickedness  of  the  two  wretches — at  her  desire 
for  money,  sheer  money ;  and  his  for  wickedness,  sheer 
wickedness.  Then  her  husband  finds  her  out — poor  Raw- 
don  !  who  with  all  his  faults  and  thick-headed  stupidity, 
has  become  absolutely  entranced  by  the  wiles  of  his  little 
wife.  He  is  carried  off  to  a  sponging-house,  in  order  that 
he  may  be  out  of  the  "way,  and,  on  escaping  unexpectedly 
from  thraldom,  finds  the  lord  in  his  wife's  drawing-room. 
Whereupon  he  thrashes  the  old  lord,  nearly  killing  him ; 
takes  away  the  plunder  which  he  finds  on  his  wife's  per- 
son, and  hurries  away  to  seek  assistance  as  to  further  re- 
venge ; — for  he  is  determined  to  shoot  the  marquis,  or  to 
be  shot.  He  goes  to  one  Captain  Macmurdo,  who  is  to 
act  as  his  second,  and  there  he  pours  out  his  heart.  "  You 
don't  know  how  fond  I  was  of  that  one,"  Rawdon  said, 
half-inarticulately.  "  Damme,  I  followed  her  like  a  foot- 
man !  I  gave  up  everything  I  had  to  her.  I'm  a  beggar 
because  I  would  marry  her.  By  Jove,  sir,  I've  pawned  my 
own  watch  to  get  her  anything  she  fancied.  And  she — 
she's  been   making  a  purse  for  herself  all  the  time,  and 


102  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

grudged  me  a  hundred  pounds  to  get  me  out  of  quod !" 
His  friend  alleges  that  the  wife  may  be  innocent  after  all. 
"It  may  be  so,"  Rawdon  exclaimed,  sadly;  "but  this 
don't  look  very  innocent!"  And  he  showed  the  captain 
the  thousand-pound  note  which  he  had  found  in  Becky's 
pocket-book. 

But  the  marquis  can  do  better  than  fight ;  and  Raw- 
don, in  spite  of  his  true  love,  can  do  better  than  follow 
the  quarrel  up  to  his  own  undoing.  The  marquis,  on  the 
spur  of  the  moment,  gets  the  lady's  husband  appointed 
go^'crnor  of  Coventry  Island,  with  a  salary  of  three  thou- 
sand pounds  a  year ;  and  poor  Rawdon  at  last  conde- 
scends to  accept  the  appointment.  He  will  not  see  his 
Avifc  again,  but  he  makes  her  an  allowance  out  of  his  in- 
come. 

In  arranging  all  this,  Thackeray  is  enabled  to  have  a 
side  blow  at  the  British  way  of  distributing  patronage — 
for  the  favour  of  which  he  was  afterwards  himself  a  can- 
didate. He  quotes  as  follows  from  The  Royalist  newspa- 
per :  "  We  hear  that  the  governorship  " — of  Coventry  Isl- 
and— "  has  been  offered  to  Colonel  Rawdon  Crawley,  C.B., 
a  distinguished  Waterloo  officer.  We  need  not  only  men 
of  acknowledged  bravery,  but  men  of  administrative  tal- 
ents to  superintend  the  affairs  of  our  colonies;  and  we 
have  no  doubt  that  the  gentleman  selected  by  the  Colo- 
nial Office  to  fill  the  lamented  vacancy  which  has  occurred 
at  Coventry  Island  is  admirably  calculated  for  the  post." 
The  reader,  however,  is  aware  that  the  officer  in  question 
cannot  write  a  sentence  or  speak  two  words  correctly. 

Our  heroine's  adventures  are  carried  on  much  further, 
but  they  cannot  be  given  here  in  detail.  To  the  end  she 
is  the  same — utterly  false,  selfish,  covetous,  and  successful. 
To  have  made  such  a  woman  really  in  love  would  havo 


III.]  VANITY  FAIR.  103 

been  a  mistake.  Her  husband  she  likes  best — because  he 
is,  or  was,  her  own.  But  there  is  no  man  so  foul,  so  wick- 
ed, so  unattractive,  but  that  she  can  fawn  over  him  for 
money  and  jewels.  There  are  women  to  whom  nothing 
is  nasty,  either  in  person,  language,  scenes,  actions,  or  prin- 
ciple— and  Becky  is  one  of  them;  and  yet  she  is  herself  *^#' 
attractive.  A  most  wonderful  sketch,  for  the  perpetration 
of  which  all  Thackeray's  power  of  combined  indignation 
and  humour  was  necessary  ! 

The  story  of  Amelia  and  her  two  lovers,  George  Osborne 
and  Captain,  or,  as  he  came  afterwards  to  be.  Major,  and 
Colonel  Dobbin,  is  less  interesting,  simply  because  good- 
ness and  eulogy  are  less  exciting  than  wickedness  and  cen- 
sure. Amelia  is  a  true,  honest-hearted,  thoroughly  Eng::_zr' 
lish  young  woman,  who  loves  her  love  because  he  is  grand 
— to  her  eyes — and  loving  him,  loves  him  with  all  her 
heart.  Readers  have  said  that  she  is  silly,  only  because 
she  is  not  heroic.  I  do  not  know  that  she  is  more  silly 
than  many  young  ladies  whom  we  who  are  old  have  loved 
in  our  youth,  or  than  those  whom  our  sons  are  loving  at 
the  present  time.  Readers  complain  of  Amelia  because 
she  is  absolutely  true  to  nature.     There  are  no  Raffaellis-  \ 

tic  touches,  no  added  graces,  no  divine  romance.  She  is 
feminine  all  over,  and  British — loving,  true,  thoroughly  ^;^ 
unselfish,  yet  with  a  taste  for  having  things  comfortable, 
forgiving,  quite  capable  of  jealousy,  but  prone  to  be  ap- 
peased at  once,  at  the  first  kiss ;  quite  convinced  that  her 
lover,  her  husband,  her  children  are  the  people  in  all  the 
world  to  whom  the  greatest  consideration  is  due.  Such 
a  one  is  sure  to  be  the  dupe  of  a  Becky  Sharp,  should 
a  Becky  Sharp  come  in  her  way — as  is  the  case  with  so 
many  sweet  Amelias  whom  we  have  known.  But  in  a  mat- 
ter of  love  she  is  sound  enouQ-h  and  sensible  enough — an<l 


lij< 


104  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

she  is  as  true  as  steel.  I  know  no  trait  in  Amelia  which 
a  man  would  be  ashamed  to  find  in  his  own  daughter. 

She  marries  her  George  Osborne,  who,  to  tell  the  truth 
of  him,  is  but  a  poor  kind  of  fellow,  though  he  is  a  brave 
soldier.  He  thinks  much  of  his  own  person,  and  is  self- 
ish. Thackeray  puts  in  a  touch  or  two  here  and  there  by 
which  he  is  made  to  be  odious.  He  would  rather  give  a 
present  to  himself  than  to  the  girl  who  loved  him.  Nev- 
ertheless, when  her  father  is  ruined  he  marries  her,  and  he 
fights  bravely  at  Waterloo,  and  is  killed.  "  No  more  fir- 
ing was  heard  at  Brussels.  The  pursuit  rolled  miles  away. 
Darkness  came  down  on  the  field  and  the  city ;  and  Ame- 
lia was  praying  for  George,  who  was  lying  on  his  face, 
dead,  with  a  bullet  through  his  heart." 

Then  follows  the  long  courtship  of  Dobbin,  the  true 
hero — he  who  has  been  the  friend  of  George  since  their 
old  school-days ;  who  has  lived  with  him  and  served  him, 
and  has  also  loved  Amelia.  But  he  has  loved  her — as 
one  man  may  love  another  —  solely  with  a  view  to  the 
profit  of  his  friend.  He  has  known  all  along  that  George 
and  Amelia  have  been  engaged  to  each  other  as  boy  and 
girl.  George  would  have  neglected  her,  but  Dobbin  would 
not  allow  it.  George  would  have  jilted  the  girl  who  loved 
him,  but  Dobbin  would  not  let  him.  He  had  nothing  to 
get  for  himself,  but  loving  her  as  he  did,  it  was  the  work 
of  his  life  to  get  for  her  all  that  she  wanted. 

George  is  shot  at  Waterloo,  and  then  come  fifteen 
years  of  widowhood  —  fifteen  years  during  which  Becky 
is  carrying  on  her  manoeuvres — fifteen  years  during  which 
Amelia  cannot  bring  herself  to  accept  the  devotion  of  the 
old  captain,  who  becomes  at  last  a  colonel.  But  at  the 
end  she  is  won.  "  The  vessel  is  in  port.  He  has  got  the 
prize  he  has  been  trying  for  all  his  life.     The  bird  has 


III.]  VANITY  FAIR.  105 

come  in  at  last.  There  it  is,  with  its  head  on  its  shoulder, 
billing  and  cooing  clean  up  to  his  heart,  with  soft,  out- 
stretched fluttering  wings.  This  is  what  he  has  asked  for 
every  day  and  hour  for  eighteen  years.  This  is  what  he 
has  pined  after.  Here  it  is — the  summit,  the  end,  the  last 
page  of  the  third  volume." 

The  reader  as  he  closes  the  book  has  on  his  mind  a 
strong  conviction,  the  strongest  possible  conviction,  that 
among  men  George  is  as  weak  and  Dobbin  as  noble  aa 
any  that  he  has  met  in  literature ;  and  that  among  women 
Amelia  is  as  true  and  Becky  as  vile  as  any  he  has  encoun- 
tered. Of  so  much  he  will  be  conscious.  In  addition  to 
this  he  will  unconsciously  have  found  that  every  page  he 
has  read  will  have  been  of  interest  to  him.  There  has 
been  no  padding,  no  longueurs ;  every  bit  will  have  had 
its  weight  with  him.  And  he  will  find  too  at  the  end,  if 
he  will  think  of  it — though  readers,  I  fear,  seldom  think 
much  of  this  in  regard  to  books  they  have  read — that  the 
lesson  taught  in  every  page  has  been  good.  There  may 
be  details  of  evil  painted  so  as  to  disgust — painted  almost 
too  plainly — but  none  painted  so  as  to  allure. 


\ 


CHAPTER  IV. 

PENDENNIS    AND    THE    NEWCOMES. 

The  absence  of  the  heroic  was,  in  Thackeray,  so  palpable 
to  Thackeray  himself  that  in  his  original  preface  to  Pen- 
dennis,  when  he  began  to  be  aware  that  his  reputation  was 
made,  he  tells  his  public  what  they  may  expect  and  what 
they  may  not,  and  makes  his  joking  complaint  of  the 
readers  of  his  time  because  they  will  not  endure  with  pa- 
tience the  true  picture  of  a  natural  man.  "  Even  the  gen- 
tlemen of  our  age,"  he  says  —  adding  that  the  story  of 
Pendennis  is  an  attempt  to  describe  one  of  them,  just  as 
he  is — "  even  those  we  cannot  show  as  they  are  with  the 
notorious  selfishness  of  their  time  and  their  education. 
Since  the  author  of  Tom  Jones  was  buried,  no  writer  of 
fiction  among  us  has  been  permitted  to  depict  to  his  ut' 
most  power  a  man.  We  must  shape  him,  and  give  him 
a  certain  conventional  temper."  Then  he  rebukes  his  au' 
dience  because  they  will  not  listen  to  the  truth.  "You 
will  not  hear  what  moves  in  the  real  world,  what  passes 
in  society,  in  the  clubs,  colleges,  mess-rooms — what  is  the 
life  and  talk  of  your  sons."  You  want  the  Raffaellistic 
touch,  or  that  of  some  painter  of  horrors  equally  removed 
from  the  truth.  I  tell  you  how  a  man  really  does  act — 
as  did  Fielding  with  Tom  Jones — but  it  does  not  satisfy 
you.     You  will  not  sympathise  with  this  young  man  of 


CHAP.  !v.]        PEXDENNIS  AND  THE  NEWCOMES.  10*7 

mine,  this  Pendennis,  because  lie  is  neither  angel  nor  imp. 
If  it  be  so,  let  it  be  so.  I  will  not  paint  for  you  angels  or 
imps,  because  I  do  not  see  them.  The  young  man  of  the 
day,  whom  I  do  see,  and  of  whom  I  know  the  inside  and 
the  out  thoroughly,  him  I  have  painted  for  you ;  and  here 
he  is,  whether  you  like  the  picture  or  not.  This  is  what 
Thackeray  meant,  and,  having  this  in  his  mind,  he  produced 
Pendennis. 

The  object  of  a  novel  should  be  to  instruct  in  morals 
while  it  amuses.  I  cannot  think  but  that  every  novelist 
who  has  thought  much  of  his  art  will  have  realised  as 
much  as  that  for  himself.  Whether  this  may  best  be 
done  by  the  transcendental  or  by  the  common-place  is  the 
question  which  it  more  behoves  the  reader  than  the  author 
to  answer,  because  the  author  may  be  fairly  sure  that  he 
who  can  do  the  one  will  not,  probably  cannot,  do  the  oth- 
er. If  a  lad  be  only  five  feet  high,  he  does  not  try  to  en- 
list in  the  Guards.  Thackeray  complains  that  many  ladies 
have  "remonstrated  and  subscribers  left  him,"  because  of 
his  realistic  tendency.  Nevertheless  he  has  gone  on  with 
his  work,  and,  in  Pendennis,  has  painted  a  young  man  as 
natural  as  Tom  Jones.  Had  he  expended  himself  in  the 
attempt,  he  could  not  have  drawn  a  Master  of  Ravens- 
wood. 

It  has  to  be  admitted  that  Pendennis  is  not  a  fine  fel- 
low. He  is  not  as  weak,  as  selfish,  as  untrustworthy  as 
that  George  Osborne  whom  Amelia  married  in  Vanity 
Fair ;  but  nevertheless,  he  is  weak,  and  selfish,  and  un- 
trustworthy. He  is  not  such  a  one  as  a  father  would 
wish  to  see  his  son,  or  a  mother  to  welcome  as  a  lover  for 
her  daughter.  But  then,  fathers  are  so  often  doomed  to 
find  their  sons  not  all  that  they  wish,  and  mothers  to  see 

their  girls  falling  in  love  with  young  men  who  are  not 
H 


108  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

Paladins.  In  our  individual  lives  we  are  contented  to  en- 
dure an  admixture  of  evil,  which  we  should  resent  if  im- 
puted to  us  in  the  general.  We  presume  ourselves  to  be 
truth-speaking,  noble  in  our  sentiments,  generous  in  our 
actions,  modest  and  unselfish,  chivalrous  and  devoted. 
But  we  forgive  and  pass  over  in  silence  a  few  delinquen- 
cies among  ourselves.  What  boy  at  school  ever  is  a  cow- 
ard —  in  the  general  ?  What  gentleman  ever  tells  a  lie  ? 
What  young  lady  is  greedy  ?  We  take  it  for  granted,  as 
though  they  were  fixed  rules  in  life,  that  our  boys  from 
our  public  schools  look  us  in  the  face  and  are  manly ;  that 
our  gentlemen  tell  the  truth  as  a  matter  of  course ;  and 
that  our  young  ladies  are  refined  and  unselfish.  Thackeray 
is  always  protesting  that  it  is  not  so,  and  that  no  good  is 
to  be  done  by  blinking  the  truth.  He  knows  that  we  have 
our  little  home  experiences.  Let  us  have  the  facts  out,  and 
mend  what  is  bad  if  we  can.  This  novel  of  Pendennis  is 
one  of  his  loudest  protests  to  this  effect. 

I  will  not  attempt  to  tell  the  story  of  Pendennis,  how 
his  mother  loved  him,  how  he  first  came  to  be  brought  up 
together  with  Laura  Bell,  how  he  thrashed  the  other  boys 
when  he  was  a  boy,  and  how  he  fell  in  love  with  Miss 
Fotheringay,  nee  Costigan,  and  was  determined  to  marry 
her  while  he  was  still  a  hobbledehoy,  how  he  went  up  to 
Boniface,  that  well-known  college  at  Oxford,  and  there 
did  no  good,  spending  money  which  he  had  not  got,  and 
learning  to  gamble.  The  English  gentleman,  as  we  know, 
never  lies ;  but  Pendennis  is  not  quite  truthful ;  when  the 
college  tutor,  thinking  that  he  hears  the  rattling  of  dice, 
makes  his  way  into  Pen's  room.  Pen  and  his  two  compan- 
ions are  found  with  three  Homers  before  them,  and  Pen 
asks  the  tutor  with  great  gravity  :  "  What  was  the  present 
condition  of  the  river  Scamander,  and  whether  it  was  nav- 


IV.]  PENDENNIS  AND  THE  NEWCOMES.  109 

igable  or  no  ?"  He  tells  his  mother  that,  during  a  certain 
vacation  he  must  stay  up  and  read,  instead  of  coming 
home — but,  nevertheless,  he  goes  up  to  London  to  amuse 
himself.  The  reader  is  scon  made  to  understand  that, 
though  Pen  may  be  a  fine  gentleman,  he  is  not  trust- 
worthy. But  he  repents  and  comes  home,  and  kisses  his 
mother;  only,  alas!  he  will  always  be  kissing  somebody 
else  also. 

The  story  of  the  Amorys  and  the  Claverings,  and  that 
wonderful  French  cook  M.  Alcide  Mirobolant,  forms  one 
of  those  delightful  digressions  which  Thackeray  scatters 
through  his  novels  rather  than  weaves  into  them.  They 
generally  have  but  little  to  do  with  the  story  itself,  and 
are  brought  in  only  as  giving  scope  for  some  incident  to 
the  real  hero  or  heroine.  But  in  this  digression  Pen  is 
very  much  concerned  indeed,  for  he  is  brought  to  the 
very  verge  of  matrimony  with  that  peculiarly  disagreea- 
ble lady  Miss  Amory.  He  does  escape  at  last,  but  only 
within  a  few  pages  of  the  end,  when  we  are  made  un- 
happy by  the  lady's  victory  over  that  poor  young  sinner 
Foker,  with  whom  we  have  all  come  to  sympathise,  in 
spite  of  his  vulgarity  and  fast  propensities.  She  would 
to  the  last  fain  have  married  Pen,  in  whom  she  believes, 
thinking  that  he  would  make  a  name  for  her.  "  II  me 
faut  des  emotions,"  says  Blanche.  Whereupon  the  author, 
as  he  leaves  her,  explains  the  nature  of  this  Miss  Amory's 
feelings.  "For  this  young  lady  was  not  able  to  carry 
out  any  emotion  to  the  full,  but  had  a  sham  enthusiasm, 
a  sham  hatred,  a  sham  love,  a  sham  taste,  a  sham  grief ; 
each  of  which  flared  and  shone  very  vehemently  for  an 
instant,  but  subsided  and  gave  place  to  the  next  sham 
emotion."  Thackeray,  when  he  drew  this  portrait,  must 
certainly  have  had  some  special  young  lady  in  his  view. 


110  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

But  though  we  are  made  unhappy  for  Foker,  Foker  too 
escapes  at  last,  and  Blanche,  with  her  emotions,  marries 
that  very  doubtful  nobleman  Comte  Montmorenci  de 
Valentinois. 

But  all  this  of  Miss  Amory  is  but  an  episode.  The 
purport  of  the  story  is  the  way  in  which  the  hero  is 
made  to  enter  upon  the  world,  subject  as  he  has  been  to 
the  sweet  teaching  of  his  mother,  and  subject  as  he  is 
made  to  be  to  the  worldly  lessons  of  his  old  uncle  the 
major.  Then  he  is  ill,  and  nearly  dies,  and  his  mother 
comes  up  to  nurse  him.  And  there  is  his  friend  War^ 
rington,  of  whose  family  down  in  Suffolk  we  shall  have 
heard  something  when  we  have  read  The  Virginians — one, 
I  think,  of  the  finest  characters,  as  it  is  certainly  one  of 
the  most  touching,  that  Thackeray  ever  drew.  Warring- 
ton, and  Pen's  mother,  and  Laura  are  our  hero's  better 
angels — angels  so  good  as  to  make  us  wonder  that  a 
creature  so  weak  should  have  had  such  angels  about 
him ;  though  we  are  driven  to  confess  that  their  affection 
and  loyalty  for  him  are  natural.  There  is  a  melancholy 
beneath  the  roughness  of  Warrington,  and  a  feminine 
softness  combined  with  the  reticent  manliness  of  the  man, 
which  have  endeared  him  to  readers  beyond  perhaps  any 
character  in  the  book.  Major  Pendennis  has  become 
immortal.  Selfish,  worldly,  false,  padded,  caring  alto- 
gether for  things  mean  and  poor  in  themselves ;  still  the 
reader  likes  him.  It  is  not  quite  all  for  himself.  To  Pen 
he  is  good — to  Pen,  who  is  the  head  of  his  family,  and  to 
come  after  him  as  the  Pendennis  of  the  day.  To  Pen 
and  to  Pen's  mother  he  is  beneficent  after  his  lights.  In 
whatever  he  undertakes,  it  is  so  contrived  that  the  reader 
shall  in  some  degree  sympathise  with  him.  And  so  it  is 
with  poor  old  Costigan,  the  drunken  Irish  captain,  Miss 


IV.]  PENDENNIS  AND  THE  NEWCOMES.  Ill 

Fotbcringay's  papa.  lie  was  not  a  pleasant  person.  "  We 
have  witnessed  the  deshabille  of  Major  Pcndennis,"  says 
our  author ;  "  will  any  one  wish  to  be  valet-de-charabre  to 
our  other  hero,  Costigan  ?  It  would  seem  that  the  cap- 
tain, before  issuing  from  his  bedroom,  scented  himself 
with  otto  of  whisky."  Yet  there  is  a  kindliness  about 
him  which  softens  our  hearts,  though  in  truth  he  is 
very  careful  that  the  kindness  shall  always  be  shown  to 
himself. 

Among  these  people  Pen  makes  his  way  to  the  end  of 
the  novel,  coming  near  to  shipwreck  on  various  occasions, 
and  always  deserving  the  shipwreck  which  he  has  almost 
encountered.  Then  there  will  arise  the  question  whether 
it  mio-ht  not  have  been  better  that  he  should  be  altoo'cther 
shipwrecked,  rather  than  housed  comfortably  with  such  a 
wife  as  Laura,  and  left  to  that  enjoyment  of  happiness 
forever  after,  which  is  the  normal  heaven  prepared  for 
heroes  and  heroines  who  have  done  their  work  well 
through  three  volumes.  It  is  almost  the  only  instance 
in  all  Thackeray's  works  in  which  this  state  of  bliss  is 
reached.  George  Osborne,  who  is  the  beautiful  lover  in 
Vanity  Fair^  is  killed  almost  before  our  eyes,  on  the 
field  of  battle,  and  we  feel  that  Nemesis  has  with  justice 
taken  hold  of  him.  Poor  old  Dobbin  does  marry  the 
widow,  after  fifteen  years  of  further  service,  when  we 
know  him  to  be  a  middle-aged  man  and  her  a  middle-aged 
woman.  That  glorious  Paradise  of  which  I  have  spoken 
requires  a  freshness  which  can  hardly  be  attributed  to 
the  second  marriage  of  a  widow  who  has  been  fifteen 
years  mourning  for  her  first  husband.  Clive  Newcome, 
"the  first  young  man,"  if  we  may  so  call  him,  of  the 
novel  Avhich  I  shall  mention  just  now,  is  carried  so  far 
beyond  his  matrimonial  elysium  that  we  are  allowed  to 


112  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

see  too  plainly  how  far  from  true  may  be  those  promises 
of  hymeneal  happiness  forever  after.  The  cares  of  mar- 
ried life  have  settled  down  heavily  upon  his  young  head 
before  we  leave  him.  He  not  only  mau'ies,  but  loses 
his  wife,  and  is  left  a  melancholy  widower  with  his  son. 
Esmond  and  Beatrix  certainly  reach  no  such  elysium  as 
that  of  which  we  are  speaking.  But  Pen,  who  surely 
deserved  a  Nemesis,  though  perhaps  not  one  so  black  as 
that  demanded  by  George  Osborne's  delinquencies,  is 
treated  as  though  he  had  been  passed  through  the  fire, 
and  had  come  out  —  if  not  pure  gold,  still  gold  good 
enough  for  goldsmiths.  "And  what  sort  of  a  husband 
will  this  Pendennis  be?"  This  is  the  question  asked  by 
the  author  himself  at  the  end  of  the  novel;  feeling,  no 
doubt,  some  hesitation  as  to  the  justice  of  what,  he  had 
just  done.  "And  what  sort  of  a  husband  will  this  Pen- 
dennis be  ?"  many  a  reader  will  ask,  doubting  the  happi- 
ness of  such  a  marriage  and  the  future  of  Laura.  The 
querists  are  referred  to  that  lady  herself,  who,  seeing  his 
faults  and  wayward  moods — seeing  and  owning  that  there 
are  better  men  than  he — loves  him  always  with  the  most 
constant  affection.  The  assertion  could  be  made  with 
perfect  confidence,  but  is  not  to  the  purpose.  That 
Laura's  affection  should  be  constant,  no  one  would  doubt ; 
but  more  than  that  is  wanted  for  happiness.  How  about 
Pendennis  and  his  constancy  ? 

Tlie  Newcomes,  which  I  bracket  in  this  chapter  with 
Pendennis,  was  not  written  till  after  Esmond,  and  ap- 
peared between  that  novel  and  The  Virginians,  which 
was  a  sequel  to  Esmond.  It  is  supposed  to  be  edited  by 
Pen,  whose  own  adventures  we  have  just  completed,  and 
is  commenced  by  that  celebrated  night  passed  by  Colonel 
Ncwcome  and  his  boy  Clive  at  the  Cave  of  Harmony, 


IV.]  PENDENNIS  AND  THE  NEWCOMES.  113 

during  which  the  colonel  is  at  first  so  pleasantly  received 
and  so  genially  entertained,  but  from  which  he  is-  at  last 
banished,  indignant  at  the  iniquities  of  our  drunken  old 
friend  Captain  Costigan,  with  whom  we  had  become 
intimate  in  Pen's  own  memoirs.  The  boy  Clive  is  de- 
scribed as  being  probably  about  sixteen.  At  the  end  of 
the  story  he  has  run  through  the  adventures  of  his  early 
life,  and  is  left  a  melancholy  man,  a  widower,  one  who 
has  suffered  the  extremity  of  misery  from  a  stepmother, 
and  who  is  wrapped  up  in  the  only  son  that  is  left  to  him 
— as  had  been  the  case  with  his  father  at  the  beginning 
of  the  novel.  The  Newcomes,  therefore,  like  Thackeray's 
other  tales,  is  rather  a  slice  from  the  biographical  memoirs 
of  a  family,  than  a  romance  or  novel  in  itself. 

It  is  full  of  satire  from  the  first  to  the  last  page.  Every 
word  of  it  seems  to  have  been  written  to  show  how  vile 
and  poor  a  place  this  world  is ;  how  prone  men  are  to  de- 
ceive, how  prone  to  be  deceived.  There  is  a  scene  in  which 
"his  Excellency  Rummun  Loll,  otherwise  his  Highness 
Rummun  Loll,"  is  introduced  to  Colonel  Newcome  —  or 
rather  presented — for  the  two  men  had  known  each  other 
before.  All  London  was  talking  of  Rummun  Loll,  taking 
him  for  an  Indian  prince,  but  the  colonel,  who  had  served 
in  India,  knew  better.  Rummun  Loll  was  no  more  than 
a  merchant,  who  had  made  a  precarious  fortune  by  doubt- 
ful means.  All  the  girls,  nevertheless,  are  running  after 
his  Excellency.  "  He's  known  to  have  two  wives  already 
in  India,"  says  Barnes  Newcome ;  "  but,  by  gad,  for  a  set- 
tlement, I  believe  some  of  the  girls  here  would  marry  him." 
We  have  a  delightful  illustration  of  the  London  girls,  with 
their  bare  necks  and  shoulders,  sitting  round  Rummun 
Loll  and  worshipping  him  as  he  reposes  on  his  low  settee. 
There  are  a  dozen  of  them  so  enchanted  that  the  men  who 

6 


114  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

wish  to  get  a  sight  of  the  Rummun  arc  quite  kept  at  a 
distance.  This  is  satire  on  the  women.  A  few  pages  on 
we  come  upon  a  clergyman  who  is  no  more  real  than  Rum- 
mun Loll.  The  clergyman,  Charles  Honeyman,  had  mar- 
ried the  colonel's  sister  and  had  lost  his  wife,  and  now  the 
brothers-in-law  meet.  "' Poor,  poor  Emma !'  exclaimed 
the  ecclesiastic,  casting  his  eyes  towards  the  chandelier  and 
passing  a  white  cambric  pocket-handkerchief  gracefully 
before  them.  No  man  in  London  understood  the  ring 
business  or  the  pocket-handkerchief  business  better,  or 
smothered  his  emotion  more  beautifully.  'In  the  gayest 
moments,  in  the  giddiest  throng  of  fashion,  the  thoughts 
of  the  past  will  rise ;  the  departed  will  be  among  us  still. 
But  this  is  not  the  strain  wherewith  to  greet  the  friend 
newly  arrived  on  our  shores.  How  it  rejoices  me  to  be- 
hold you  in  old  England !' "  And  so  the  satirist  goes  on 
with  Mr.  Honeyman  the  clergyman.  Mr.  Honeyman  the 
clergyman  has  been  already  mentioned,  in  that  extract 
made  in  our  first  chapter  from  Lovel  the  Widoiver.  It 
was  he  who  assisted  another  friend,  "  with  his  wheedling 
tongue,"  in  inducing  Thackeray  to  purchase  that  "neat 
little  literary  paper  " — called  then  The  Museum,  but  which 
was  in  truth  The  National  Standard.  In  describing 
Barnes  Newcome,  the  colonel's  relative,  Thackeray  in  the 
same  scene  attacks  the  sharpness  of  the  young  men  of  busi- 
ness of  the  present  day.  There  were,  or  were  to  be,  some 
transactions  with  Rummun  Loll,  and  Barnes  Newcome,  be- 
ing in  doubt,  asks  the  colonel  a  question  or  two  as  to  the 
certainty  of  the  Rummun's  money,  much  to  the  colonel's 
disgust.  "  The  young  man  of  business  had  dropped  his 
drawl  or  his  languor,  and  was  speaking  quite  unaffectedly, 
good-naturedly,  and  selfishly.  Had  you  talked  to  him  for 
a  week  you  would  not  have  made  him  understand  the 


IV.]  PENDENNIS  AND  THE  NEWCOMES.  115 

scorn  and  loathing  with  which  the  colonel  regarded  him. 
Here  was  a  young  fellow  as  keen  as  the  oldest  curmud- 
geon— a  lad  with  scarce  a  beard  to  his  chin,  that  would 
pursue  his  bond  as  rigidly  as  Shylock."  "Barnes  New- 
come  never  missed  a  church,"  he  goes  on,  "  or  dressing  for 
dinner.  He  never  kept  a  tradesman  waiting  for  his  money. 
He  seldom  drank  too  much,  and  never  was  late  for  busi- 
ness, or  huddled  over  his  toilet,  however  brief  his  sleep  or 
severe  his  headache.  In  a  word,  he  was  as  scrupulously 
whited  as  any  sepulchre  in  the  whole  bills  of  mortality." 
Thackeray  had  lately  seen  some  Barnes  Newcome  when  he 
wrote  that. 

It  is  all  satire ;  but  there  is  generally  a  touch  of  pathos 
even  through  the  satire.  It  is  satire  when  Miss  Quigley, 
the  governess  in  Park  Street,  falls  in  love  with  the  old 
colonel  after  some  dim  fashion  of  her  own.  "  When  she 
is  walking  with  her  little  charges  in  the  Park,  faint  signals 
of  welcome  appear  on  her  wan  cheeks.  She  knows  the 
dear  colonel  amidst  a  thousand  horsemen."  The  colonel 
had  drunk  a  glass  of  wine  with  her  after  his  stately  fash- 
ion, and  the  foolish  old  maid  thinks  too  much  of  it.  Then 
we  are  told  how  she  knits  purses  for  him,  "as  she  sits 
alone  in  the  schoolroom  —  high  up  in  that  lone  house, 
when  the  little  ones  are  long  since  asleep — before  her  dis- 
mal little  tea-tray,  and  her  little  desk  containing  her  moth- 
er's letters  and  her  mementoes  of  home."  Miss  Quigley  is 
an  ass ;  but  we  are  made  to  sympathise  entirely  with  the 
ass,  because  of  that  morsel  of  pathos  as  to  her  mother's 
letters. 

Clive  Newcome,  our  hero,  who  is  a  second  Pen,  but  a 
better  fellow,  is  himself  a  satire  on  young  men — on  young 
men  who  are  idle  and  ambitious  at  the  same  time.  He  is 
a  painter ;  but,  instead  of  being  proud  of  his  art,  is  half 


116  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

ashamed  of  it — because  not  being  industrious  be  has  not, 
while  yet  young,  learned  to  excel.  He  is  "  doing  "  a  por- 
trait of  Mrs.  Pendennis,  Laura,  and  thus  speaks  of  his  busi- 
ness. "No.  666  " — he  is  supposed  to  be  quoting  from  the 
catalogue  of  the  Royal  Academy  for  the  year — "  No.  666. 
Portrait  of  Joseph  Muggins,  Esq.,  Newcome,  George  Street. 
No.  979.  Portrait  of  Mrs.  Muggins  on  her  gray  pony.  New- 
come.  No.  579.  Portrait  of  Joseph  Muggins,  Esq.'s  dog 
Toby,  Newcome.  This  is  what  I  am  fit  for.  These  are 
the  victories  I  have  set  myself  on  achieving.  Oh,  Mrs. 
Pendennis!  isn't  it  humiliating?  Why  isn't  there  a  war? 
Why  haven't  I  a  genius?  There  is  a  painter  who  lives 
hard  by,  and  who  begs  me  to  come  and  look  at  his  work. 
He  is  in  the  Muggins  line  too.  He  gets  his  canvases  with 
a  good  light  upon  them;  excludes  the  contemplation  of 
other  objects;  stands  beside  his  picture  in  an  attitude 
himself;  and  thinks  that  he  and  they  are  masterpieces. 
Oh  me,  what  drivelling  wretches  we  are !  Fame  !  —  ex- 
cept that  of  just  the  one  or  two — what's  the  use  of  it?" 
In  all  of  which  Thackeray  is  speaking  his  own  feelings 
about  himself  as  well  as  the  world  at  large.  What's  the 
use  of  it  all?  Oh  vanitas  vanitatum !  Oh  vanity  and 
vexation  of  spirit !  "  So  Clive  Newcome,"  he  says  after- 
wards, "  lay  on  a  bed  of  down  and  tossed  and  tumbled 
there.  He  went  to  fine  dinners,  and  sat  silent  over  them ; 
rode  fine  horses,  and  black  care  jumped  up  behind  the 
moody  horseman."  As  I  write  this  I  have  before  me  a 
letter  from  Thackeray  to  a  friend  describing  his  own  suc- 
cess when  Vanity  Fair  was  coming  out,  full  of  the  same 
feeling.  He  is  making  money,  but  he  spends  it  so  fast 
that  he  never  has  any ;  and  as  for  the  opinions  expressed 
on  his  books,  he  cares  little  for  what  he  hears.  There  was 
always  present  to  him  a  feeling  of  black  .care  seated  be- 


IT.]  PENDENNIS  AND  THE  NEWCOMES.  Ill 

hind  the  horseman — and  would  have  been  equally  so  had 
there  been  no  real  care  present  to  him.  A  sardonic  mel- 
ancholy was  the  characteristic  most  common  to  him — 
which,  however,  was  relieved  by  an  always  present  capac- 
ity for  instant  frolic.  It  was  these  attributes  combined 
which  made  him  of  all  satirists  the  most  humorous,  and  of 
all  humorists  the  most  satirical.  It  was  these  that  pro- 
duced the  Osbornes,  the  Dobbins,  the  Pens,  the  Clives,  and 
the  Newcomes,  whom,  when  he  loved  them  the  most,  he 
could  not  save  himself  from  describing  as  mean  and  un- 
worthy. A  somewhat  heroic  hero  of  romance  —  such  a 
one,  let  us  say,  as  Waverley,  or  Lovel  in  The  Antiquary^  or 
Morton  in  Old  Mortality — was  revolting  to  him,  as  lack- 
ing those  foibles  which  human  nature  seemed  to  him  to 
demand. 

The  story  ends  with  two  sad  tragedies,  neither  of  which 
would  have  been  demanded  by  the  story,  had  not  such 
sadness  been  agreeable  to  the  author's  own  idiosyncrasy. 
The  one  is  the  ruin  of  the  old  colonel's  fortunes,  he  hav- 
ing allowed  himself  to  be  enticed  into  bubble  speculations ; 
and  the  other  is  the  loss  of  all  happiness,  and  even  com- 
fort, to  Clive  the  hero,  by  the  abominations  of  his  mother- 
in-law.  The  woman  is  so  iniquitous,  and  so  tremendous 
in  her  iniquities,  that  she  rises  to  tragedy.  Who  does  not 
know  Mrs,  Mack  the  Campaigner?  "Why  at  the  end  of  his 
long  story  should  Thackeray  have  married  his  hero  to  so 
lackadaisical  a  heroine  as  poor  little  Rosey,  or  brought  on 
the  stage  such  a  she-demon  as  Rosey's  mother  ?  But  there 
is  the  Campaigner  in  all  her  vigour,  a  marvel  of  strength 
of  composition — one  of  the  most  vividly  drawm  characters 
in  fiction — but  a  woman  so  odious  that  one  is  induced  to 
doubt  whether  she  should  have  been  depicted. 

The  other  tragedy  is  altogether  of  a  different  kind,  and 


118  THACKERAY.  [chap.  iv. 

though  unnecessary  to  the  story,  and  contrary  to  that 
practice  of  story-telling  which  seems  to  demand  that  ca- 
lamities to  those  personages  with  whom  we  are  to  sympa- 
thise should  not  be  brought  in  at  the  close  of  a  work  of 
fiction,  is  so  beautifully  told  that  no  lover  of  Thackeray's 
work  would  be  willing  to  part  with  it.  The  old  colonel, 
as  we  have  said,  is  ruined  by  speculation,  and  in  his  ruin  is 
brought  to  accept  the  alms  of  the  brotherhood  of  the  Grey 
Friars.  Then  we  are  introduced  to  the  Charter  House,  at 
which,  as  most  of  us  know,  there  still  exists  a  brotherhood 
of  the  kind.  He  dons  the  gown  —  this  old  colonel,  who 
had  always  been  comfortable  in  his  means,  and  latterly 
apparently  rich  —  and  occupies  the  single  room,  and  eats 
the  doled  bread,  and  among  his  poor  brothers  sits  in  the 
chapel  of  his  order.  The  description  is  perhaps  as  fine  as 
anything  thalT  Thackeray  ever  did.  The  gentleman  is  still 
the  gentleman,  with  all  the  pride  of  gentry ; — but  not  the 
less  is  he  the  humble  bedesman,  aware  that  he  is  living 
upon  charity,  not  made  to  grovel  by  any  sense  of  shame, 
but  knowing  that,  though  his  normal  pride  may  be  left  to 
him,  an  outward  demeanour  of  humility  is  befitting. 

And  then  he  dies.  "At  the  usual  evening  hour  the 
chapel  bell  began  to  toll,  and  Thomas  Newcome's  hands 
outside  the  bed  feebly  beat  time — and  just  as  the  last  bell 
struck,  a  peculiar  sweet  smile  shone  over  his  face,  and  he 
lifted  up  his  head  a  little,  and  quickly  said, ' Adsum ' — and 
fell  back.  It  was  the  word  we  used  at  school  when  names 
were  called  ;  and,  lo,  he  whose  heart  was  as  that  of  a  little 
child  had  answered  to  his  name,  and  stood  in  the  presence 
of  his  Maker  1" 


CHAPTER  V. 

ESMOND   AND   THE   VIRGINIANS. 

The  novel  with  whicli  we  are  now  going  to  deal  I  regard 
as  the  greatest  work  that  Thackeray  did.  Though  I  do 
not  hesitate  to  compare  himself  with  himself,  I  will  make 
no  comparison  between  him  and  others ;  I  therefore  ab- 
stain from  assigning  to  Esmond  any  special  niche  among 
prose  fictions  in  the  English  language,  but  I  rank  it  so 
high  as  to  justify  me  in  placing  him  among  the  small 
number  of  the  highest  class  of  English  novelists.  Much  as 
I  think  of  Barry  Lyndon  and  Vanity  Fair,  I  cannot  quite 
say  this  of  them  ;  but,  as  a  chain  is  not  stronger  than  its 
"weakest  link,  so  is  a  poet,  or  a  dramatist,  or  a  novelist  to 
be  placed  in  no  lower  level  than  that  which  he  has  attained 
by  his  highest  sustained  flight.  The  excellence  which  has 
been  reached  here  Thackeray  achieved,  without  doubt,  by 
giving  a  greater  amount  of  forethought  to  the  work  he 
had  before  him  than  had  been  his  wont.  When  we  were 
young  we  used  to  be  told,  in  our  house  at  home,  that  "  el- 
bow-grease" was  the  one  essential  necessary  to  getting  a 
tough  piece  of  work  well  done.  If  a  mahogany  table  was 
to  be  made  to  shine,  it  was  elbow-grease  that  the  operation 
needed.  Forethought  is  the  elbow-grease  which  a  novelist 
— or  poet — or  dramatist — requires.  It  is  not  only  his  plot 
that  has  to  be  turned  and  re-turned  in  his  mind,  not  his 


120  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

plot  chiefly,  but  he  has  to  make  himself  sure  of  his  situa- 
tions, of  his  characters,  of  his  effects,  so  that  when  the 
time  comes  for  hitting  the  nail  he  may  know  where  to  hit 
it  on  the  head — so  that  he  may  himself  understand  the 
passion,  the  calmness,  the  virtues,  the  vices,  the  rewards 
and  punishments  which  he  means  to  explain  to  others — so 
that  his  proportions  shall  be  correct,  and  he  be  saved  froto 
the  absurdity  of  devoting  two-thirds  of  his  book  to  the 
beginning,  or  two-thirds  to  the  completion  of  his  task.  It 
is  from  want  of  this  special  labour,  more  frequently  than 
from  intellectual  deficiency,  that  the  tellers  of  stories  fail 
so  often  to  hit  their  nails  on  the  head.  To  think  of  a 
story  is  much  harder  work  than  to  write  it.  The  author 
can  sit  down  with  the  pen  in  his  hand  for  a  given  time, 
and  produce  a  certain  number  of  words.  That  is  compar- 
atively easy,  and  if  he  have  a  conscience  in  regard  to  his 
task,  work  will  be  done  regularly.  But  to  think  it  over  as 
you  lie  in  bed,  or  walk  about,  or  sit  cosily  over  your  fire, 
to  turn  it  all  in  your  thoughts,  and  nxake__the_thi_ngs^fit — ■ 
that  requires  elbow-grease  of  the  mind.  The  arrangement 
of  the  words  is  as  though  you  were  walking  simply  along 
a  road.  The  arrangement  of  your  story  is  as  though  you 
were  carrying  a  sack  of  flour  while  you  walked.  Fielding 
had  carried  his  sack  of  flour  before  he  wrote  Tom  Jones, 
and  Scott  his  before  he  produced  Ivanlioe.  So  had 
Thackeray  done — a  very  heavy  sack  of  flour — in  creating 
Msmond.  In  VaniUj  Fair,<Ln  Pendennis,  and  in  The  New^ 
comes,  there  was  more  of  that  mere  wandering  in  which 
no  heavy  burden  was  borne.  The  richness  of  the  author's 
mind,  the  beauty  of  his  language,  his  imagination  and 
perception  of  character,  are  all  there.  For  that  which 
was  lovely  he  has  shown  his  love,  and  for  the  hateful 
his  hatred ;  but,  nevertheless,  they  are  comparatively  idle 


v.]  ESMOND  AND  THE  VIRGINIANS.  121 

books.  His  only  work,  as  far  as  I  can  judge  tliem,  in 
wliicli  there  is  no  touch  of  idleness,  is  Esmond,  Barry 
Lyndon  is  consecutive,  and  has  the  well-sustained  purpose 
of  exhibiting  a  finished  rascal ;  but  Barry  Lyndon  is  not 
quite  the  same  from  beginning  to  end.  All  his  full-fledged 
novels,  except  Esmond,  contain  rather  strings  of  incidents 
and  memoirs  of  individuals,  than  a  completed  story.  But 
Es7nond  is  a  whole  from  beginning  to  end,  with  its  tale 
well  told,  its  purpose  developed,  its  moral  brought  home — 
and  its  nail  hit  well  on  the  head  and  driven  in. 

I  told  Thackeray  once  that  it  was  not  only  his  best 
work,  but  so  much  the  best,  that  there  was  none  second 
to  it.  "  That  was  what  I  intended,"  he  said,  "  but  I  have 
failed.  Nobody  reads  it.  After  all,  what  does  it  matter?" 
he  went  on  after  awhile.  "  If  they  like  anything,  one 
ought  to  be  satisfied.  After  all,  Esmond  was  a  prig." 
Then  he  laughed  and  changed  the  subject,  not  caring  to 
dwell  on  thoughts  painful  to  liim.  The  elbow-grease  of 
thinking  was  always  distasteful  to  him,  and  had  no  doubt 
been  so  when  he  conceived  and  carried  out  this  work. 

To  the  ordinary  labour  necessary  for  such  a  novel  he 
added  very  much  by  his  resolution  to  write  it  in  a  style 
different,  not  only  from  that  which  he  had  made  his  own, 
but  from  that  also  which  belonged  to  the  time.  He  had 
devoted  himself  to  the  reading  of  the  literature  of  Queen 
Anne's  reign,  and  having  chosen  to  throw  his  story  into 
that  period,  and  to  create  in  it  personages  who  were  to  be 
peculiarly  concerned  with  the  period,  he  resolved  to  use  as 
the  vehicle  for  his  story  the  forms  of  expression  then  prev- 
alent. No  one  who  has  not  tried  it  can  understand  how 
great  is  the  difficulty  of  mastering  a  phase  of  one's  own 
language  other  than  that  which  habit  has  made  familiar. 
To  write  in  another  lano^uao'e,  if  the  lano;uao:e  be  suflfi- 

6* 


122  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

cicntly  known,  is  a  much  less  arduous  undertaking.  The 
lad  who  attempts  to  write  his  essay  in  Ciceronian  Latin 
struggles  to  achieve  a  style  which  is  not  indeed  common 
to  him,  but  is  more  common  than  any  other  he  has  be- 
come acquainted  with  in  that  tongue.  But  Thackeray  in 
his  work  had  always  to  remember  his  Swift,  his  Steele, 
and  his  Addison,  and  to  forget  at  the  same  time  the  modes 
of  expression  which  the  day  had  adopted.  Whether  he 
asked  advice  on  the  subject,  I  do  not  know.  But  I  feel 
sure  that  if  he  did  he  must  have  been  counselled  against 
it.  Let  my  reader  think  what  advice  he  would  give  to 
any  writer  on  such  a  subject.  Probably  he  asked  no  ad- 
vice, and  would  have  taken  none.  No  doubt  he  found 
himself,  at  first  imperceptibly,  gliding  into  a  phraseology 
which  had  attractions  for  his  ear,  and  then  probably  was 
so  charmed  with  the  peculiarly  masculine  forms  of  sen- 
tences which  thus  became  familiar  to  him,  that  he  thought 
it  would  be  almost  as  diflScult  to  drop  them  altogether  as 
altogether  to  assume  the  use  of  them.  And  if  he  could  do 
so  successfully,  how  great  would  be  the  assistance  given 
to  the  local  colouring  which  is  needed  for  a  novel  in  prose, 
the  scene  of  which  is  thrown  far  back  from  the  writer's 
period !  Were  I  to  write  a  poem  about  Coeur  de  Lion,  I 
should  not  mar  my  poem  by  using  the  simple  Language  of 
the  day ;  but  if  I  write  a  prose  story  of  the  time,  I  cannot 
altogether  avoid  some  attempt  at  far-away  quaintnesses  in 
language.  To  call  a  purse  a  "  gypsire,"  and  to  begin  your 
little  speeches  with  "  Marry  come  up,"  or  to  finish  them 
with  "  Quotha,"  are  but  poor  attempts.  But  even  they 
have  had  their  effect.  Scott  did  the  best  he  could  with 
his  Coeur  de  Lion.  W^hen  we  look  to  it  yvo  find  that  it 
was  but  little ;  though  in  his  hands  it  passed  for  much. 
"  By  my  troth,"  said  the  knight,  "  thou  hast  sung  well  and 


v.j  ESMOND  AND  THE  VIRGINIANS.  123 

heartily,  and  in  high  praise  of  thine  order."  We  donbt 
whether  he  achieved  any  similarity  to  the  language  of  the 
time ;  but  still,  even  in  the  little  which  he  attempted,  there 
was  something  of  the  picturesque.  But  how  much  more 
would  be  done  if  in  very  truth  the  whole  language  of  a 
story  could  be  thrown  with  correctness  into  the  form  of 
expression  used  at  the  time  depicted? 

It  was  this  that  Thackeray  tried  in  his  Esmond^  and  he 
has  done  it  almost  without  a  flaw.  The  time  in  question 
is  near  enough  to  us,  and  the  literature  sufficiently  familiar 
to  enable  us  to  judge.  Whether  folk  swore  by  their  troth 
in  the  days  of  King  Richard  I.  we  do  not  know,  but  when 
we  read  Swift's  letters,  and  Addison's  papers,  or  Defoe's 
novels,  we  do  catch  the  veritable  sounds  of  Queen  Anne's 
age,  and  can  say  for  ourselves  whether  Thackeray  has 
caught  them  correctly  or  not.  No  reader  can  doubt  that 
he  has  done  so.  Nor  is  the  reader  ever  struck  with  the 
affectation  of  an  assumed  dialect.  The  words  come  as 
though  they  had  been  written  naturally — though  not  nat- 
ural to  the  middle  of  the  nineteenth  century.  It  was  a 
tour  de  force^  and  successful  as  such  a  tour  de  force  so 
seldom  is.  But  though  Thackeray  was  successful  in  adopt- 
ing the  tone  he  wished  to  assume,  he  never  quite  succeed- 
ed, as  far  as  my  ear  can  judge,  in  altogether  dropping  it 
again. 

And  yet  it  has  to  be  remembered  that  though  Esmond. 
deals  with  the  times  of  Queen  Anne,  and  "copies  the  lan- 
guage" of  the  time,  as  Thackeray  himself  says  in  the  ded- 
ication, the  story  is  not  supposed  to  have  been  written  till 
the  reign  of  George  II.  Esmond  in  his  narrative  speaks 
ot  Fielding  and  Hogarth,  who  did  their  best  work  ilnder 
George  II.  The  idea  is  that  Henry  Esmond,  the  hero, 
went  out  to  Virginia  after  the  events  told,  and  there  wrote 


124  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

the  memoir  in  the  form  of  an  autobiography.  The  estate 
or  Gastlewood,  in  Virginia,  had  been  given  to  the  Esmond 
family  by  Charles  11. ;  and  this  Esmond,  onr  hero,  finding 
that  expatriation  would  best  suit  both  his  domestic  happi- 
ness and  his  political  difficulties — as  the  reader  of  the  book 
■will  understand  might  be  the  case — settles  himself  in  the 
colony,  and  there  writes  the  history  of  his  early  life.  He 
retains  the  manners,  and  with  the  manners  the  language 
of  his  youth.  He  lives  among  his  own  people,  a  country 
gentleman  with  a  broad  domain,  mixing  but  little  with  the 
world  beyond,  and  remains  an  English  gentleman  of  the 
time  of  Queen  Anne.  The  story  is  continued  in  The  Vir- 
ginians^ the  name  given  to  a  record  of  two  lads  who  were 
grandsons  of  Harry  Esmond,  whose  names  are  Warring- 
ton. Before  The  Virginians  appeared  we  had  already  be- 
come acquainted  with  a  scion  of  that  family,  the  friend  of 
Arthur  Pendennis,  a  younger  son  of  Sir  Miles  AVarrington, 
of  Suffolk.  Henry  Esmond's  daughter  had  in  a  previous 
generation  married  a  younger  son  of  the  then  baronet. 
This  is  mentioned  now  to  show  the  way  in  which  Thack- 
eray's mind  worked  afterwards  upon  the  details  and  char- 
acters which  he  had  originated  in  Esmond. 

It  is  not  my  purpose  to  tell  the  story  here,  but  rather 
to  explain  the  way  in  which  it  is  written,  to  show  how  it 
differs  from  other  stories,  and  tlius  to  explain  its  effect, 
Harry  Esmond,  who  tells  the  story,  is  of  course  the  hero. 
There  are  two  heroines  who  equally  command  our  sympa- 
thy— Lady  Gastlewood,  the  wife  of  Harry's  kinsman,  and 
her  daughter  Beatrix.  Thackeray  himself  declared  the 
man  to  be  a  prig,  and  lie  was  not  altogether  wrong.  Bea- 
trix, with  whom  throughout  the  whole  book  he  is  in  love, 
knew  him  well.  "  Shall  I  be  frank  with  you,  Harry,"  sue 
says,  when  she  is  engaged  to  another  suitor,  "and  say  that 


v.]  ESMOND  AND  THE  VIRGINIANS.  125 

if  you  had  not  been  down  on  your  knees  and  so  humble, 
you  might  have  fared  better  with  me?  A  woman  of  my 
spirit,  cousin,  is  to  be  won  by  gallantry,  and  not  by  sighs 
and  rueful  faces.  All  the  time  you  are  worshipping  and 
singing  hymns  to  me,  I  know  very  well  I  am  no  goddess." 
And  again:  "As  for  you,  you  want  a  woman  to  bring 
your  slippers  and  cap,  and  to  sit  at  your  feet  and  cry,  O 
caro,  caro !  O  bravo !  whilst  you  read  your  Shakespeares 
and  Miltons  and  stuff."  He  was  a  prig,  and  the  girl  he 
loved  knew  him,  and  being  quite  of  another  way  of  think- 
ing herself,  would  have  nothing  to  say  to  him  in  the  way 
of  love.  But  without  something  of  the  aptitudes  of  a 
prig  the  character  which  the  author  intended  could  not 
have  been  drawn.  There  was  to  be  courage  —  military 
courage — and  that  propensity  to  fighting  which  the  tone 
of  the  age  demanded  in  a  finished  gentleman.  Esmond, 
therefore,  is  ready  enough  to  use  his  sword.  But  at  the 
same  time  he  has  to  live  as  becomes  one  whose  name  is  in 
some  degree  under  a  cloud ;  for  though  he  be  not  in  truth 
an  illegitimate  offshoot  of  the  noble  family  which  is  his, 
and  though  he  knows  that  he  is  not  so,  still  he  has  to  liv^e 
as  though  he  were.  He  becomes  a  soldier,  and  it  was  just 
then  that  our  army  was  accustomed  "  to  swear  horribly 
in  Flanders."  But  Esmond  likes  his  books,  and  cannot 
swear  or  drink  like  other  soldiers.  Nevertheless  he  has  a 
sort  of  liking  for  fast  ways  in  others,  knowing  that  such 
are  the  ways  of  a  gallant  cavalier.  There  is  a  melancholy 
over  his  life  which  makes  him  always,  to  himself  and  to 
others,  much  older  than  his  years.  He  is  well  aware  that, 
being  as  he  is,  it  is  impossible  that  Beatrix  should  love 
him.  Now  and  then  there  is  a  dash  of  lightness  about 
him,  as  though  he  had  taught  himself,  in  his  philosophy, 
that  even  sorrow  may  be  borne  with  a  smile — as  though 


126  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

there  was  something  in  him  of  the  Stoic's  doctrine,  which 
made  him  feel  that  even  disappointed  love  should  not  be 
seen  to  wound  too  deep.  But  still,  when  he  smiles,  even 
when  he  indulges  in  some  little  pleasantry,  there  is  that 
garb  of  melancholy  over  him  which  always  makes  a  man  a 
prig.  But  he  is  a  gentleman  from  the  crown  of  his  head 
to  the  sole  of  his  foot.  Thackeray  had  let  the  whole 
power  of  his  intellect  apply  itself  to  a  conception  of  the 
character  of  a  gentleman.  This  man  is  brave,  polished, 
gifted  with  that  old-fashioned  courtesy  which  ladies  used 
to  love,  true  as  steel,  loyal  as  faith  himself,  with  a  power 
of  self-abnegation  which  astonishes  the  criticisincr  reader 

CD  O 

when  he  finds  such  a  virtue  carried  to  such  an  extent  with- 
out seeming  to  be  unnatural.  To  draw  the  picture  of  a 
man,  and  say  that  he  is  gifted  with  all  the  virtues,  is  easy 
enough — easy  enough  to  describe  him  as  performing  all 
the  virtues.  The  diflSculty  is  to  put  your  man  on  his  legs, 
and  make  him  move  about,  carrying  his  virtues  with  a  nat- 
ural gait,  so  that  the  reader  shall  feel  that  he  is  becoming 
acquainted  with  flesh  and  blood,  not  with  a  wooden  figure. 
The  virtues  are  all  there  with  Henry  Esmond,  and  the 
flesh  and  blood  also,  so  that  the  reader  believes  in  them. 
But  still  there  is  left  a  flavour  of  the  character  which 
Thackeray  himself  tasted  when  he  called  his  hero  a  prig. 

The  two  heroines.  Lady  Castlewood  and  Beatrix,  are 
mother  and  daughter,  of  whom  the  former  is  in  love  with 
Esmond,  and  the  latter  is  loved  by  him.  Fault  has  been 
found  with  the  story,  because  of  the  unnatural  rivalry — 
because  it  has  been  felt  that  a  mother's  solicitude  for  her 
daughter  should  admit  of  no  such  juxtaposition.  But  the 
criticism  has  come,  I  think,  from  those  who  have  failed  to 
understand,  not  from  those  who  have  understood  the  tale,* 
not  because  they  have  read  it,  but  because  they  have  not 


V.J  ESMOND  AND  TUE  VIRGINIANS.  127 

read  it,  and  have  only  looted  at  it  or  heard  of  it.  Lady 
Castlewood  is  perhaps  ten  years  older  than  the  boy  Es- 
mond, whom  she  first  finds  in  her  husband's  house,  and 
takes  as  a  protege ;  and  from  the  moment  in  which  she 
finds  that  he  is  in  love  with  her  own  daughter,  she  does 
her  best  to  brino:  about  a  marriafice  between  them.  Her 
husband  is  alive,  and  though  he  is  a  drunken  brute — after 
the  manner  of  lords  of  that  time — she  is  thoroughly  loyal 
to  him.  The  little  touches,  of  which  the  woman  is  herself 
altogether  unconscious,  that  gradually  turn  a  love  for  the 
boy  into  a  love  for  the  man,  are  told  so  delicately,  that  it 
is  only  at  last  that  the  reader  perceives  what  has  in  truth 
happened  to  the  woman.  She  is  angry  with  him,  grate- 
ful to  him,  careful  over  him,  gradually  conscious  of  all  his 
worth,  and  of  all  that  he  does  to  her  and  hers,  till  at  last 
her  heart  is  unable  to  resist.  But  then  she  is  a  widow  ; — ■ 
and  Beatrix  has  declared  that  her  ambition  will  not  allow 
her  to  marry  so  humble  a  swain,  and  Esmond  has  become 
— as  he  says  of  himself  when  he  calls  himself  "  an  old  gen- 
tleman " — "  the  guardian  of  all  the  family,"  "  fit  to  be  tho 
grandfather  of  you  all." 

The  character  of  Lady  Castlewood  has  required  more 
delicacy  in  its  manipulation  than  perhaps  any  other  which 
Thackeray  has  drawn.  There  is  a  mixture  in  it  of  self- 
negation  and  of  jealousy,  of  gratefulness  of  heart  and  of 
the  weary  thoughtfulness  of  age,  of  occasional  sprightli- 
ness  with  deep  melancholy,  of  injustice  with  a  thorough 
appreciation  of  the  good  around  her,  of  personal  weakness 
— as  shown  always  in  her  intercourse  with  her  children, 
and  of  personal  strength  —  as  displayed  when  she  vindi- 
cates the  position  of  her  kinsman  Henry  to  the  Duke  of 
Hamilton,  who  is  about  to  marry  Beatrix;  —  a  mixture 
which  has  required  a  master's  hand  to  trace.     These  con- 


128  .   THACKERAY.  [chap. 

tradictions  are  essentially  feminine.  Perhaps  it  must  be 
confessed  that  in  the  unreasonableness  of  the  woman,  the 
author  has  intended  to  bear  more  harshly  on  the  sex  than 
it  deserves.  But  a  true  woman  will  forgive  him,  because 
of  the  truth  of  Lady  Castlewood's  heart.  Her  husband 
had  been  killed  in  a  duel,  and  there  were  circumstances 
which  had  induced  her  at  the  moment  to  quarrel  with 
Harry  and  to  be  unjust  to  him.  He  had  been  ill,  and 
had  gone  away  to  the  wars,  and  then  she  had  learned  the 
truth,  and  had  been  wretched  enough.  But  when  he 
comes  back,  and  she  sees  him,  by  chance  at  first,  as  the 
anthem  is  being  sung  in  the  cathedral  choir,  as  she  is  say- 
ing her  prayers,  her  heart  flows  over  with  tenderness  to 
him.  "  I  knew  you  would  come  back,"  she  said;  "and 
to-day,  Henry,  in  the  anthem  when  they  sang  it — 'When 
the  Lord  turned  the  captivity  of  Zion  we  were  like  them 
that  dream ' — I  thought,  yes,  like  them  that  dream — them 
that  dream.  And  then  it  went  on,  'They  that  sow  in 
tears  shall  reap  in  joy,  and  he  that  goeth  forth  and  weep- 
eth  shall  doubtless  come  home  again  with  rejoicing,  bring- 
ing his  sheaves  with  him.'  I  looked  up  from  the  book 
and  saw  you.  I  was  not  surprised  when  I  saw  you.  I 
knew  you  would  come,  my  dear,  and  saw  the  gold  sun- 
shine round  your  head."  And  so  it  goes  on  running  into 
expressions  of  heart-melting  tenderness.  And  yet  she  her- 
self does  not  know  that  her  own  heart  is  seeking  his  with 
all  a  woman's  love.  She  is  still  willing  that  he  should 
possess  Beatrix.  "  I  would  call  you  my  son,"  she  says, 
"  sooner  than  the  greatest  prince  in  Europe."  But  she 
warns  him  of  the  nature  of  her  own  girl.  "  'Tis  for  my 
poor  Beatrix  I  tremble,  whose  headstrong  will  affrights 
me,  whose  jealous  temper,  and  whose  vanity  no  prayers  of 
mine  can  cure."      It  is  but  very  gradually  that  Esmond 


v.]  ESMOND  AND  THE  VIRGINIANS.  129 

becomes  aware  of  the  truth.  Indeed,  he  has  not  become 
altogether  aware  of  it  till  the  tale  closes.  The  reader  does 
not  see  that  transfer  of  affection  from  the  dano-hter  to  the 
mother  which  would  fail  to  reach  his  sympathy.  In  the 
last  page  of  the  last  chapter  it  is  told  that  it  is  so — that 
Esmond  marries  Lady  Castlewood — but  it  is  not  told  till 
all  the  incidents  of  the  story  have  been  completed. 

But  of  the  three  characters  I  have  named,  Beatrix  is  the 
one  that  has  most  strongly  exercised  the  writer's  powers, 
and  will  most  interest  the  reader.  As  far  as  outward  per- 
son is  concerned,  she  is  very  lovely — so  charming  that  ev- 
ery man  that  comes  near  to  her  submits  himself  to  her  at- 
tractions and  caprices.  It  is  but  rarely  that  a  novelist  can 
succeed  in  impressing  his  reader  with  a  sense  of  female 
loveliness.  Tlie  attempt  is  made  so  frequently — comes  so 
much  as  a  matter  of  course  in  every  novel  that  is  written, 
and  fails  so  much  as  a  matter  of  course,  that  the  reader 
does  not  feel  the  failure.  There  are  things  which  we  do 
not  expect  to  have  done  for  us  in  literature,  because  they 
are  done  so  seldom.  Novelists  are  apt  to  describe  the  ru- 
ral scenes  among  which  their  characters  play  their  parts, 
but  seldom  leave  any  impression  of  the  places  described. 
Even  in  poetry  how  often  does  this  occur?  The  words 
used  are  pretty,  well  chosen,  perhaps  musical  to  the  ear, 
and  in  that  way  befitting ;  but  unless  the  spot  has  violent 
characteristics  of  its  own,  such  as  Burley's  cave  or  the  wa- 
terfall of  Lodore,  no  striking  portrait  is  left.  Nor  are  we 
disappointed  as  we  read,  because  we  have  not  been  taught 
to  expect  it  to  be  otherwise.  So  it  is  with  those  word- 
painted  portraits  of  women,  which  are  so  frequently  given 
and  so  seldom  convey  any  impression.  AVho  has  an  idea 
of  the  outside  look  of  Sophia  Western,  or  Edith  Bellen- 
den,  or  even  of  Imogen,  though  lachimo,  who  described 


130  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

her,  was  so  good  at  words  ?  A  series  of  pictures — illustra- 
tions— as  we  have  with  Dickens'  novels,  and  with  Thack- 
eray's, may  leave  an  impression  of  a  figure — though  even 
then  not  often  of  feminine  beauty.  But  in  this  work 
Thackeray  has  succeeded  in  imbuing  us  with  a  sense  of 
the  outside  loveliness  of  Beatrix  by  the  mere  force  of 
words.  We  are  not  only  told  it,  but  we  feel  that  she  was 
such  a  one  as  a  man  cannot  fail  to  covet,  even  when  his 
judgment  goes  against  his  choice. 

Here  the  judgment  goes  altogether  against  the  choice. 
The  girl  grows  up  before  us  from  her  early  youth  till  her 
twenty-fifth  or  twenty-sixth  year,  and  becomes  —  such  as 
her  mother  described  her — one  whose  headlong  will,  whose 
jealousy,  and  whose  vanity  notliing  could  restrain.  She 
has  none  of  those  soft  foibles,  half  allied  to  virtues,  by 
which  weak  women  fall  away  into  misery  or  perhaps  dis- 
traction. She  does  not  want  to  love  or  to  be  loved.  She 
does  not  care  to  be  fondled.  She  has  no  longing  for  ca- 
resses. She  wants  to  be  admired — and  to  make  use  of 
the  admiration  she  shall  achieve  for  the  material  purposes 
of  her  life.  She  wishes  to  rise  in  the  world ;  and  her 
beauty  is  the  sword  with  which  she  must  open  her  oyster. 
As  to  her  heart,  it  is  a  thing  of  which  she  becomes  aware, 
only  to  assure  herself  that  it  must  be  laid  aside  and  put 
out  of  the  question.  Now  and  again  Esmond  touches  it. 
She  just  feels  that  she  has  a  heart  to  be  touched.  But  she 
never  has  a  doubt  as  to  her  conduct  in  that  respect.  She 
will  not  allow  her  dreams  of  ambition  to  be  disturbed  by 
such  folly  as  love. 

In  all  that  there  might  be  something,  if  not  good  and 
great,  nevertheless  grand,  if  her  ambition,  though  worldly, 
had  in  it  a  touch  of  nobility.  But  this  poor  creature  is 
made  with  her  bleared  blind  .eyes  to  fall  into  the  very 


v.]  ESMOND  AND  THE  VIRGINIANS.  131 

lowest  depths  of  feminine  ignobility.  One  lover  comes 
after  another.  Ilarry  Esmond  is,  of  course,  the  lover  with 
whom  the  reader  interests  himself.  At  last  there  comes 
a  duke — fifty  years  old,  indeed,  but  with  semi-royal  appa- 
nages. As  his  wife  she  will  become  a  duchess,  with  many 
diamonds,  and  be  Her  Excellency.  The  man  is  stern,  cold, 
and  jealous;  but  she  does  not  doubt  for  a  moment.  She 
is  to  be  Duchess  of  Hamilton,  and  towers  already  in  pride 
of  place  above  her  mother,  and  her  kinsman  lover,  and  all 
her  belongings.  The  story  here,  with  its  little  incidents 
of  birth,  and  blood,  and  ignoble  pride,  and  gratified  ambi- 
tion, with  a  dash  of  true  feminine  nobility  on  the  part  of 
the  girl's  mother,  is  such  as  to  leave  one  with  the  impres- 
sion that  it  has  hardly  been  beaten  in  English  prose  fic- 
tion. Then,  in  the  last  moment,  the  duke  is  killed  in  a 
duel,  and  the  news  is  brought  to  the  girl  by  Esmond. 
She  turns  upon  him  and  rebukes  him  harshly.  Then  she 
moves  away,  and  feels  in  a  moment  that  there  is  nothing 
left  for  her  in  this  world,  and  that  she  can  only  throw  her- 
self upon  devotion  for  consolation.  "  I  am  best  in  my 
own  room  and  by  myself,"  she  said.  Her  eyes  were  quite 
dry,  nor  did  Esmond  ever  see  them  otherwise,  save  once, 
in  respect  of  that  grief.  She  gave  him  a  cold  hand  as  she 
went  out.  "  Thank  you,  brother,"  she  said  in  a  low  voice, 
and  with  a  simplicity  more  touching  than  tears ;  "  all  that 
you  have  said  is  true  and  kind,  and  I  will  go  away  and 
will  ask  pardon." 

But  the  consolation  coming  from  devotion  did  not  go 
far  with  such  a  one  as  her.  AVe  cannot  rest  on  relio-ion 
merely  by  saying  that  we  will  do  so.  Very  speedily  there 
comes  consolation  in  another  form.  Queen  Anne  is  on 
her  deathbed,  and  a  young  Stuart  prince  appears  upon 
the  scene,  of  whom  some  loyal  hearts  dream  that  they 


132  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

can  make  a  king.  He  is  such  as  Stuarts  were,  and  only 
walks  across  the  novelist's  canvas  to  show  his  folly  and 
hcartlessness.  But  there  is  a  moment  in  which  Beatrix 
thinks  that  she  may  rise  in  the  world  to  the  proud  place 
of  a  royal  mistress.  That  is  her  last  ambition  !  That  is 
her  pride !  That  is  to  be  her  glory !  The  bleared  eyes 
can  see  no  clearer  than  that.  But  the  mock  prince  passes 
away,  and  nothing  but  the  disgrace  of  the  wish  remains. 

Such  is  the  story  of  Esmond,  leaving  with  it,  as  does 
all  Thackeray's  work,  a  melancholy  conviction  of  the  van- 
ity of  all  things  human.  Vanitas  vanitatum,  as  he  wrote 
on  the  pages  of  the  French  lady's  album,  and  again  in  one 
of  the  earlier  numbers  of  The  Cornhill  Magazine.  With 
much  that  is  picturesque,  much  that  is  droll,  much  that 
is  valuable  as  being  a  correct  picture  of  the  period  select- 
ed, the  gist  of  the  book  is  melancholy  throughout.  It 
ends  with  the  promise  of  happiness  to  come,  but  that  is 
contained  merely  in  a  concluding  paragraph.  The  one 
woman,  during  the  course  of  the  story,  becomes  a  widow, 
with  a  living  love  in  which  she  has  no  hope,  with  children 
for  whom  her  fears  are  almost  stronger  than  her  affection, 
who  never  can  rally  herself  to  happiness  for  a  moment. 
The  other,  with  all  her  beauty  and  all  her  brilliance,  be- 
comes what  we  have  described — and  marries  at  last  her 
brother's  tutor,  who  becomes  a  bishop  by  means  of  her 
intrigues.  Esmond,  the  hero,  who  is  compounded  of  all 
good  gifts,  after  a  childhood  and  youth  tinged  throughout 
with  melancholy,  vanishes  from  us,  with  the  promise  that 
he  is  to  be  rewarded  by  the  hand  of  the  mother  of  the 
girl  he  has  loved. 

And  yet, there  is  not  a  page  in  the  book  over  which  a 
thoughtful  reader  cannot  pause  with  delight.  The  nature 
in  it  is  true  nature.     Given  a  story  thus  sad,  and  persons 


v.]  ESMOND  AND  THE  VIRGINIANS.  133 

thus  situated,  and  it  is  thus  that  the  details  would  follow 
each  other,  and  thus  that  the  people  would  conduct  them- 
selves. It  was  the  tone  of  Thackeray's  mind  to  turn  away 
from  the  prospect  of  things  joyful,  and  to  see — or  believe 
that  he  saw — in  all  human  affairs,  the  seed  of  something 
base,  of  something  which  would  be  antagonistic  to  true 
contentment.  All  his  snobs,  and  all  his  fools,  and  all  his 
knaves,  come  from  the  same  conviction.  Is  it  not  the 
doctrine  on  which  our  relio-ion  is  founded  —  thouo-h  the 
sadness  of  it  there  is  alleviated  by  the  doubtful  promise 
of  a  heaven  ? 

Though  thrice  a  thousand  years  are  passed 
Since  David's  son,  the  sad  and  splendid, 

The  weary  king  ecclesiast 

Upon  his  awful  tablets  penned  it. 

So  it  was  that  Thackeray  preached  his  sermon.  But 
melancholy  though  it  be,  the  lesson  taught  in  Esmond 
is  salutary  from  beginning  to  end.  The  sermon  truly 
preached  is  that  glory  can  only  come  from  that  which  is 
truly  glorious,  and  that  the  results  of  meanness  end  al- 
ways in  the  mean.  No  girl  will  be  taught  to  wish  to  shine 
like  Beatrix,  nor  will  any  youth  be  made  to  think  that  to 
gain  the  love  of  such  a  one  it  can  be  worth  his  while  to 
expend  his  energy  or  his  heart. 

Esmond  was  published  in  1852.  It  was  not  till  1858, 
some  time  after  he  had  returned  from  his  lecturing  tours, 
that  he  published  the  sequel  called  The  Virginians.  It 
was  first  brought  out  in  twenty -four  monthly  numbers, 
and  ran  through  the  years  1858  and  1859,  Messrs.  Brad- 
bury and  Evans  having  been  the  publishers.  It  takes  up 
by  no  means  the  story  of  Esmond,  and  hardly  the  charac- 
ters.    The  twin  lads,  who  are  called  the  Virginians,  and 


134  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

whose  name  is  Warrington,  arc  grandsons  of  Esmond  find 
his  wife  Lady  Castlewood.  Their  one  daughter,  born  at 
the  estate  in  Virginia,  had  married  a  Warrington,  and  the 
Virginians  are  the  issue  of  that  marriage.  In  the  story, 
one  is  sent  to  England,  there  to  make  his  way;  and  the 
other  is  for  awhile  supposed  to  have  been  killed  by  the  In- 
dians. How  he  was  not  killed,  but  after  awhile  comes 
again  forward  in  the  world  of  fiction,  will  be  found  in  the 
story,  which  it  is  not  our  purpose  to  set  forth  here.  The 
most  interesting  part  of  the  narrative  is  that  which  tells 
us  of  the  later  fortunes  of  Madame  Beatrix — the  Baroness 
Bernstein — the  lady  who  had  in  her  youth  been  Beatrix 
Esmond,  who  had  then  condescended  to  become  Mrs. 
Tusher,  the  tutor's  wife,  whence  she  rose  to  be  the  "  lady  " 
of  a  bishop,  and,  after  the  bishop  had  been  put  to  rest 
under  a  load  of  marble,  had  become  the  baroness — a  rich 
old  woman,  courted  by  all  her  relatives  because  of  her 
wealth. 

In  The  Virginians,  as  a  work  of  art,  is  discovered,  more 
strongly  than  had  shown  itself  yet  in  any  of  his  works, 
that  propensity  to  wandering  which  came  to  Thackeray 
because  of  his  idleness.  It  is,  I  think,  to  be  found  in 
every  book  he  ever  wrote — except  Esmond;  but  is  here 
more  conspicuous  than  it  had  been  in  his  earlier  years. 
Though  he  can  settle  himself  down  to  his  pen  and  ink — 
not  always  even  to  that  svithout  a  struggle,  but  to  that 
with  sufficient  burst  of  energy  to  produce  a  large  average 
amount  of  work — he  cannot  settle  himself  down  to  the 
task  of  contriving  a  story.  There  have  been  those  — 
and  they  have  not  been  bad  judges  of  literature — who 
Lave  told  me  that  they  have  best  liked  these  vague  nar- 
ratives. The  mind  of  the  man  has  been  clearly  exhibited 
.in  them.     In  them  he  has  spoken  out  his  thoughts,  and 


v.]  ESMOND  AND  THE  VIRGINIANS.  135 

given  the  world  to  know  his  convictions,  as  well  as  could 
hav^e  been  done  in  the  carrying  out  any  well-conducted 
plot.  And  though  the  narratives  be  vague,  the  characters 
are  alive.  In  The  Virginians,  the  two  young  men  and 
their  mother,  and  the  other  ladies  with  whom  they  have 
to  deal,  and  especially  their  aunt,  the  Baroness  Bernstein, 
are  all  alive.  For  desultory  reading,  for  that  picking  up 
of  a  volume  now  and  again  which  requires  permission  to 
forget  the  plot  of  a  novel,  this  novel  is  admirably  adapted. 
There  is  not  a  page  of  it  vacant  or  dull.  But  he  who 
takes  it  up  to  read  as  a  whole,  will  find  that  it  is  the  work 
of  a  desultory  writer,  to  whom  it  is  not  unfrequently  dif- 
ficult to  remember  the  incidents  of  his  own  narrative. 
"  How  good  it  is,  even  as  it  is ! — but  if  he  would  have 
done  his  best  for  us,  what  might  he  not  have  done  !"  This, 
I  think,  is  what  we  feel  when  we  read  The  Virginians. 
The  author's  mind  has  in  one  way  been  active  enough — 
and  powerful,  as  it  always  is ;  but  he  has  been  unable  to 
fix  it  to  an  intended  purpose,  and  has  gone  on  from  day 
to  day  furthering  the  difficulty  he  has  intended  to  mas- 
ter, till  the  book,  under  the  stress  of  circumstances — de- 
mands for  copy  and  the  like — has  been  completed  before 
the  difficulty  has  even  in  truth  been  encountered. 


CHAPTER  VI. 

Thackeray's  burlesques. 

As  so  niucli  of  Thackeray's  writing  partakes  of  the  nature 
of  burlesque,  it  would  have  been  unnecessary  to  devote  a 
separate  chapter  to  the  subject,  were  it  not  that  there  are 
among  his  tales  two  or  three  so  exceedingly  good  of  their 
kind,  coming  so  entirely  up  to  our  idea  of  what  a  prose 
burlesque  should  be,  that  were  I  to  omit  to  mention  them 
I  should  pass  over  a  distinctive  portion  of  our  author's 
work. 

The  volume  cnWcd  Burlesques,  \n\h\ls\\Gd  in  18G9,  begins 
with  the  Novels  hy  Eminent  Hands,  and  Jeames''s  Dianj^ 
to  which  I  have  already  alluded.  It  contains  also  The 
Tremendous  Adventures  of  Major  Gahagan,  A  Legend  of 
the  Rhine  J  and  Rebecca  and  Rowena.  It  is  of  these  that 
I  will  now  speak.  The  History  of  the  Next  French  Revo- 
lution and  Cox's  Diary,  with  which  the  volume  is  con- 
cluded, are,  according  to  my  thinking,  hardly  equal  to  the 
others ;  nor  are  they  so  properly  called  burlesques. 

Nor  will  I  say  much  of  Major  Gahagan,  though  his  ad- 
ventures arc  very  good  fun.  lie  is  a  warrior — that  is,  of 
course — and  he  is  one  in  whose  wonderful  narrative  all 
that  distant  India  can  produce  in  the  way  of  boasting, 
is  superadded  to  Ireland's  best  efforts  in  the  same  line. 
Baron  Munchausen  was  nothing  to  him  ;  and  to  the  bare 


CHAP.  VI.]  THACKERAY'S  BURLESQUES.  137 

and  simple  miracles  of  the  baron  is  joined  that  humour 
without  which  Thackeray  never  tells  any  story.  This  is 
broad  enough,  no  doubt,  but  is  still  humour — as  when  the 
major  tells  us  that  he  always  kept  in  his  own  apartment  a 
small  store  of  gunpowder;  "always  keeping  it  under  my 
bed,  with  a  candle  burning  for  fear  of  accidents."  Or 
when  he  describes  his  courage ;  "  I  was  running — running 
as  the  brave  staoj  before  the  hounds — runnino;,  as  I  have 
done  a  great  number  of  times  in  my  life,  when  there  w^as 
no  help  for  it  but  a  run."  Then  he  tells  us  of  his  diges- 
tion. "  Once  in  Spain  I  ate  the  leg  of  a  horse,  and  was  so 
eager  to  swallow  this  morsel,  that  I  bolted  the  shoe  as  well 
as  the  hoof,  and  never  felt  the  slightest  inconvenience 
from  either."  He  storms  a  citadel,  and  has  only  a  snuff- 
box given  him  for  his  reward.  "  Never  mind,"  says  Ma- 
jor Gahagan ;  "  when  they  want  me  to  storm  a  fort  again, 
I  shall  know  better."  By  which  we  perceive  that  the  ma- 
jor remembered  his  Horace,  and  had  in  his  mind  the  sol- 
dier who  had  lost  his  purse.  But  the  major's  adventures, 
excellent  as  they  are,  lack  the  continued  interest  which  is 
attached  to  the  two  following  stories. 

Of  what  nature  is  The  Legend  of  the  Rhine^  we  learn 
from  the  commencement.  "  It  w^as  in  the  good  old  days 
of  chivalry,  when  every  mountain  that  bathes  its  shadow 
in  the  Rhine  had  its  castle  ;  not  inhabited  as  now  by  a  few 
rats  and  owls,  nor  covered  with  moss  and  wallflowers  and 
funguses  and  creeping  ivy.  No,  no;  where  the  ivy  now 
clusters  there  grew  strong  portcullis  and  bars  of  steel ; 
where  the  wallflowers  now  quiver  in  the  ramparts  there 
were  silken  banners  embroidered  with  wonderful  heraldry; 
men-at-arms  marched  where  now  you  shall  only  see  a  bank 
of  moss  or  a  hideous  black  champignon ;  and  in  place  of 
the  rats  and  owlets,  I  warrant  me  there  were  ladies  and 

7 


138  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

knights  to  revel  in  the  great  halls,  and  to  feast  and  dance, 
and  to  make  love  there."  So  that  we  know  well  before- 
hand of  what  kind  will  this  story  be.  It  will  be  pure  ro- 
mance— burlesqued.  "  Ho  seneschal,  fill  rae  a  cup  of  hot 
liquor;  put  sugar  in  it,  good  fellow;  yea,  and  a  little  hot 
water — but  very  little,  for  my  soul  is  sad  as  I  think  of 
those  days  and  knights  of  old." 

A  knio-ht  is  ridinjr  alone  on  his  war-horse,  with  all  his 
armour  with  him — and  his  luggage.  His  rank  is  shown 
by  the  name  on  his  portmanteau,  and  his  former  address 
and  present  destination  by  a  card  which  was  attached.  It 
had  run,  "  Count  Ludwig  de  Hombourg,  Jerusalem,  but  the 
name  of  the  Holy  City  had  been  dashed  out  with  the  pen, 
and  that  of  Godesberg  substituted."  "  By  St.  Hugo  of 
Katzenellcnbogcn,"  said  the  good  knight,  shivering,  "  'tis 
colder  here  than  at  Damascus.  Shall  I  be  at  Godesberg 
in  time  for  dinner  ?"  He  has  come  to  see  his  friend 
Count  Karl,  Margrave  of  Godesberg, 

But  at  Godesberg  evei'ything  is  in  distress  and  sorrow. 
There  is  a  new  inmate  there,  one  Sir  Gottfried,  since  whose 
arrival  the  knio-ht  of  the  castle  has  become  a  wretched 
man,  having  been  taught  to  believe  all  evils  of  his  wife, 
and  of  his  child  Otto,  and  a  certain  stranger,  one  Ililde- 
brandt.  Gottfried,  we  see  with  half  an  eye,  has  done  it 
all.  It  is  in  vain  that  Ludwig  de  Hombourg  tells  his  old 
friend  Karl  that  this  Gottfried  is  a  thoroughly  bad  fel- 
low, that  he  had  been  found  to  be  a  card -sharper  in  the 
Holy  Land,  and  had  been  drummed  out  of  his  regiment. 
"'Twas  but  some  silly  quarrel  over  the  wine-cup,"  says 
Karl.  "  Huo-o  de  Brodeucl  would  have  no  black  bottle  on 
the  board."  We  think  we  can  remember  the  quarrel  of 
"Brodenel"  and  the  black  bottle,  though  so  many  things 
have  taken  place  since  that. 


VI.]  TUACKERAY'S  BURLESQUES.  139 

Til  ere  is  a  festival  in  the  castle,  and  Hildebrandt  comes 
with  the  other  guests.  Then  Ludwig's  attention  is  called 
by  poor  Karl,  the  father,  to  a  certain  family  likeness.  Can 
it  be  that  he  is  not  the  father  of  his  own  child?  lie  is 
playing  cards  with  his  friend  Ludwig  when  that  traitor 
Gottfried  comes  and  whispers  to  him,  and  makes  an  ap- 
pointment. "  I  will  be  there  too,"  thought  Count  Lud- 
wig, the  good  Knight  of  Hombourg. 

On  the  next  morning,  before  the  stranger  knight  had 
shaken  off  his  slumbers,  all  had  been  found  out  and  every- 
thing done.  The  lady  had  been  sent  to  a  convent  and  her 
son  to  a  monastery.  The  knight  of  the  castle  has  no  com- 
fort but  in  his  friend  Gottfried,  a  distant  cousin  who  is  to 
inherit  everything.  All  this  is  told  to  Sir  Ludwig — who 
immediately  takes  steps  to  repair  the  mischief.  "A  cup 
of  coffee  straight,"  says  he  to  the  servitors.  "Bid  the 
cook  pack  me  a  sausage  and  bread  in  paper,  and  the  groom 
saddle  Streithenojst.  We  have  far  to  ride."  So  this  re- 
dresser  of  wrongs  starts  off,  leaving  the  Margrave  in  his 
grief. 

Then  there  is  a  great  fight  between  Sir  Ludwig  and  Sir 
Gottfried,  admirably  told  in  the  manner  of  the  later  chron- 
iclers— a  hermit  sitting  by  and  describing  everything  al- 
most as  well  as  Rebecca  did  on  the  tow^r.  Sir  Ludwig 
being  in  the  right,  of  course  gains  the  day.  But  the  es- 
cape of  the  fallen  knight's  horse  is  the  cream  of  this  chap- 
ter. "  Away,  ay,  away  ! — away  amid  the  green  vineyards 
and  golden  cornfields ;  away  up  the  steep  mountains,  where 
he  frightened  the  eagles  in  their  eyries;  away  down  the 
clattering  ravines,  where  the  flashing  cataracts  tumble ; 
away  through  the  dark  pine -forests,  where  the  hungry 
wolves  are  howling;  away  over  the  dreary  wolds,  where 
the  wild  wind  walks  alone ;  away  through  the  splashing 
K 


140  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

quagmires,  where  the  "will -o'- the  wisp  slunk  frightened 
among  the  reeds ;  away  through  light  and  darkness,  storm 
and  sunshine ;  away  by  tower  and  town,  highroad  and 
hamlet.  .  .  .  Brave  horse !  gallant  steed !  snorting  child  of 
Araby  !  On  went  the  horse,  over  mountains,  rivers,  turn- 
pikes, applewomen ;  and  never  stopped  until  he  reached  a 
livery-stable  in  Cologne,  where  his  master  was  accustomed 
to  put  him  up  I" 

The  conquered  knight,  Sir  Gottfried,  of  course  reveals 
the  truth.  This  Hildebrandt  is  no  more  than  the  lady's 
brother — as  it  happened  a  brother  in  disguise — and  hence 
the  likeness.  AVicked  knights,  when  they  die,  always  di- 
vulge their  wicked  secrets,  and  this  knight  Gottfried  does 
so  now.  Sir  Ludwig  carries  the  new^s  home  to  the  afflict- 
ed husband  and  father ;  who  of  course  instantly  sends  ofi 
messeno;ers  for  his  wife  and  son.  The  wife  won't  come. 
All  she  wants  is  to  have  her  dresses  and  jewels  sent  to  her. 
Of  so  cruel  a  husband  she  has  had  enough.  As  for  the 
son,  he  has  jumped  out  of  a  boat  on  the  Rhine,  as  he  was 
being  carried  to  his  monastery,  and  was  drowned  ! 
*  But  he  was  not  drowned,  but  had  only  dived.  "The 
gallant  boy  swam  on  beneath  the  water,  never  lifting  his 
head  for  a  single  moment  between  Godesberg  and  Cologne ; 
the  distance  being  twenty-five  or  thirty  miles." 

Then  he  becomes  an  archer,  dressed  in  green  from  head 
to  foot.  IIow  it  was  is  all  told  in  the  story  ;  and  he  goes 
to  shoot  for  a  prize  at  the  Castle  of  Adolf  the  Duke  of 
Cleeves.  On  his  way  he  shoots  a  raven  marvellously — al- 
most as  marvellously  as  did  Robin  Hood  the  twig  in  Ivan- 
hoe.  Then  one  of  his  companions  is  married,  or  nearly 
married,  to  the  mysterious  "  Lady  of  Windeck  " — would 
liave  been  married  but  for  Otto,  and  that  the  bishop  and 
dean,  who  were  dragged  up  from  their  long-ago  graves  to 


VI.]  THACKERAY'S  BURLESQUES.  141 

perform  the  ghostly  ceremony,  were  prevented  by  tlie  ill- 
timed  mirth  of  a  certain  old  canon  of  the  church  named 
Schidnischmidt.  The  reader  has  to  read  the  name  out 
loud  before  he  recognizes  an  old  friend.  But  this  of  the 
Lady  of  Windeck  is  an  episode. 

IIow  at  the  shooting -match,  which  of  course  ensued, 
Otto  shot  for  and  won  the  heart  of  a  fair  lady,  the  duke's 
daughter,  need  not  be  told  here,  nor  how  he  quarrelled 
with  the  Rowski  of  Donnerblitz — the  hideous  and  sulky, 
but  rich  and  powerful,  nobleman  who  had  come  to  take 
the  hand,  whether  he  could  win  the  heart  or  not,  of  the 
dano'hter  of  the  duke.  It  is  all  arranixed  accordinof  to  the 
proper  and  rouiantic  order.  Otto,  though  he  enlists  in 
the  duke's  archer-guard  as  simple  soldier,  contrives  to  fight 
with  the  Rowski  de  Donnerblitz,  Margrave  of  Eulenschren- 
kenstein,  and  of  course  kills  him.  " '  Yield,  yield,  Sir 
Rowski!'  shouted  he,  in  a  calm  voice.  A  blow  dealt  mad- 
ly at  his  head  was  the  reply.  It  was  the  last  blow  that  the 
Count  of  Eulenschrenkenstein  ever  struck  in  battle.  The 
curse  was  on  his  lips  as  the  crashing  steel  descended  into 
his  brain  and  split  it  in  two.  He  rolled  like  a  dog  from 
his  horse,  his  enemy's  knee  was  in  a  moment  on  his  chest, 
and  the  dagger  of  mercy  at  his  throat,  as  the  knight  once 
more  called  upon  him  to  yield."  The  knight  was  of 
course  the  archer  who  had  come  forward  as  an  unknown 
champion,  and  had  touched  the  Rowski's  shield  with  the 
point  of  his  lance.  For  this  story,  as  well  as  the  rest,  is 
a  burlesque  on  our  dear  old  favourite  Ivanhoe. 

That  everything  goes  right  at  last,  that  the  wife  comes 
back  from  her  monastery,  and  joins  her  jealous  husband, 
and  that  the  duke's  daughter  has  always,  in  truth,  known 
that  the  poor  archer  was  a  noble  knight — these  things  are 
all  matters  of  course. 


142  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

But  the  best  of  the  three  burlesques  ia  Rebecca  and 
Mowena,  or  A  Romance  upon  Romance,  which  I  need  not 
tell  my  readers  is  a  continuation  of  Ivanhoe.  Of  this  bur- . 
lesque  it  is  the  peculiar  characteristic  that,  while  it  has  been 
written  to  ridicule  the  persons  and  the  incidents  of  that 
perhaps  the  most  favourite  novel  in  the  English  language, 
it  has  been  so  written  that  it  would  not  have  offended  the 
author  had  he  lived  to  read  it,  nor  does  it  disgust  or  annoy 
Ihose  who  most  love  the  origiufil.  There  is  not  a  word 
in  it  having  an  intention  to  belittle  Scott.  It  has  sprung 
from  the  genuine  humour  created  in  Thackeray's  mind  by 
his  aspect  of  the  romantic.  We  remember  how  reticent, 
how  dignified  was  Rowena — how  cold  we  perhaps  thought 
her,  whether  there  was  so  little  of  that  billing  and  cooing, 
that  kissing  and  squeezing,  between  her  and  Ivanhoe  which 
we  used  to  think  necessary  to  lovers'  blisses.  And  there 
was  left,  too,  on  our  minds  an  idea  that  Ivanhoe  had  liked 
the  Jewess  almost  as  well  as  Rowena,  and  that  Rowena 
might  possibly  have  become  jealous.  Thackeray's  mind 
at  once  went  to  work  and  pictured  to  him  a  Rowena  such 
as  such  a  woman  might  become  after  marriage ;  and  as 
Ivanhoe  was  of  a  melancholy  nature  and  apt  to  be  hipped, 
and  grave,  and  silent,  as  a  matter  of  course  Thackeray  pre- 
sumes him  to  have  been  henpecked  after  his  marriage. 

Our  dear  Wamba  disturbs  his  mistress  in  some  devo- 
tional conversation  with  her  chaplain,  and  the  stern  lady 
orders  that  the  fool  shall  have  three-dozen  lashes.  "  I  got 
you  out  of  Front  de  Boeuf  's  castle,"  said  poor  Wamba, 
piteously  appealing  to  Sir  Wilfrid  of  Ivanhoe,  "  and  canst 
thou  not  save  me  from  the  lash  ?" 

''Yes;  from  Front  de  Bceuf's  castle,  %vhcn  you  were 
locked  up  with  the  Jewess  in  the  toiverP^  said  Rowena, 
haughtily  replying  to  the  timid  appeal  of  her  husband. 


VI.]  THACKERAY'S  BURLESQUES.  143 

"Giirtli,  give  Liiii  four- dozen"  —  and  this  was  all  poor 
Wamba  got  by  applying  for  the  mediation  of  Ms  master. 
Then  the  satirist  moralises :  "  Did  you  ever  know  a  right- 
minded  woman  pardon  another  for  being  handsomer  and 
more  love  -  worthy  than  herself  ?"  Rowcna  is  "  always 
flinging  Rebecca  into  Ivanhoe's  teeth ;"  and  altogether  life 
at  Rotherwood,  as  described  by  the  later  chronicles,  is  not 
very  happy  even  when  most  domestic.  Ivanhoc  becomes 
sad  and  moody.  He  takes  to  drinking,  and  his  lady  does 
not  forget  to  tell  him  of  it.  "  Ah,  dear  axe  I"  he  exclaims, 
apostrophising  his  weapon,  "  ah,  gentle  steel !  that  was  a 
merry  time  when  I  sent  thee  crashing  into  the  pate  of  the 
Emir  Abdul  Melek!"  There  was  nothing  left  to  him  but 
his  memories ;  and  "  in  a  word,  his  life  was  intolerable." 
So  he  determines  that  he  will  go  and  look  after  King 
Richard,  who  of  course  was  wandering  abroad.  lie  antici- 
pates a  little  difficulty  with  his  wife ;  but  she  is  only  too 
happy  to  let  him  go,  comforting  herself  with  the  idea  that 
Athelstane  will  look  after  her.  So  her  hnsband  starts  on 
his  joaraey.  "Then  Ivanhoe's  trumpet  blew.  Then  Row- 
ena  waved  her  pocket-handkerchief.  Then  the  household 
gave  a  shout.  Then  the  pursuivant  of  the  good  knight, 
Sir  Wilfrid  the  Crusader,  flung  out  his  banner  —  which 
was  argent,  a  gules  cramoisy  with  three  Moors  impaled — 
then  Wamba  gave  a  lash  on  his  mule's  haunch,  and  Ivan- 
hoe,  heaving  a  great  sigh,  turned  the  tail  of  his  war-horse 
upon  the  castle  of  his  fathers." 

Ivanhoe  finds  Coenr  de  Leon  besieging  the  Castle  of 
Chalons,  and  there  they  both  do  wondrous  deeds,  Ivanhoo 
always  surpassing  the  king.  The  jealousy  of  the  courtiers, 
the  ingratitude  of  the  king,  and  the  melancholy  of  the 
knight,  who  is  never  comforted  except  when  he  has  slaugh- 
tered some  hundreds,  are  delightful.     Roger  dc  Backbite 


144  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

and  Peter  de  Toadliole  are  intended  to  be  quite  real.  Then 
his  majesty  sings,  passing  off  as  his  own  a  song  of  Charles 
Lever's.  Sir  Wilfrid  declares  the  truth,  and  twits  the  king 
with  his  falsehood,  -whereupon  he  has  the  guitar  thrown  at 
his  head  for  his  pains.  He  catches  the  guitar,  however, 
gracefully  in  his  left  hand,  and  sings  his  owm  immortal 
ballad  of  King  Canute — than  which  Thackeray  never  did 
anything  better. 

"  Might  I  stay  the  sun  above  us,  good  Sir  Bishop  ?"  Canute  cried ; 
"  Could  I  bid  the  silver  moon  to  pause  upon  her  heavenly  ride  ? 
If  the  moon  obeys  my  orders,  sure  I  can  command  the  tide. 

Will  the  advancing  waves  obey  me,  Bishop,  if  I  make  the  sign  ?" 
Said  the  bishop,  bowing  lowly:  "Land  and  sea,  my  lord,  are  thine." 
Canute  turned  towards  the  ocean :  "  Back,"  he  said,  "  thou  foaming 
brine." 

But  the  sullen  ocean  answered  -with  a  louder,  deeper  roar, 

And  the  rapid  waves  drew  nearer,  falling,  sounding  on  the  shore ; 

Back  the  keeper  and  the  bishop,  back  the  king  and  courtiers  bore. 

We  must  go  to  the  book  to  look  at  the  picture  of  the 
king  as  he  is  killing  the  youngest  of  the  sons  of  the 
Count  of  Chalons.  Those  illustrations  of  Doyle's  are  ad- 
mirable. The  size  of  the  king's  head,  and  the  size  of  his 
battle-axe  as  contrasted  with  the  size  of  the  child,  are  bur- 
lesque all  over.  But  the  king  has  been  wounded  by  a 
bolt  from  the  bow  of  Sir  Bertrand  do  Gourdon  while  he 
is  slaughtering  the  infant,  and  there  is  an  end  of  him. 
Ivanhoe,  too,  is  killed  at  the  siege — Sir  Roger  de  Backbite 
having  stabbed  him  in  the  back  during  the  scene.  Had 
he  not  been  then  killed,  his  widow  Rowena  could  not  have 
married  iVthelstane,  which  she  soon  did  after  hearing  the 
sad  news ;  nor  could  he  have  had  that  celebrated  epitaph 
in  Latin  and  Eufrlish: 


VI.]  THACKERAY'S  BUKLESQUES.  145 

Hie  est  Guilfridus,  belli  dum  vixit  avidus. 
Cum  gladeo  et  lancea  Novmanuia  et  quoque  Francia 
Yerbera  dura  dabat.     Per  Turcos  multum  equitabat. 
Guilbertum  occidit ; — atque  Hyerosolyma  vidit. 
Heu  !  nunc  sub  fossa  sunt  tanti  militis  ossa. 
Uxor  Athelstani  est  conjux  castissima  Thani.* 

The  translation,  we  are  told,  was  by  Wamba : 

Under  the  stone  you  behold,  Brian,  the  Templar  untrue, 

Buried  and  coffined  and  cold,  Fairly  in  tourney  he  slew  ; 

Lieth  Sir  Wilfrid  the  Bold.  Saw  Hierusalem  too. 

Always  he  marched  in  advance.  Now  he  is  buried  and  gone, 

Warring  in  Flandei's  and  France,  Lying  beneath  the  gray  stone. 

Doughty   with   sword  and   with  Where    shall    you    find  .such   a 
lance.  one  ? 

Famous  in  Saracen  fight.  Long  time  his  widow  deplored, 

Rode    in    his   youth,  the   Good  Weeping,  the  fate  of  her  lord. 

Knight,  Sadly  cut  off  by  the  sword. 
Scattering  Paynims  in  flight. 

When  she  was  eased  of  her  pain, 
Came  the  good  lord  Athelstane, 
When  her  ladyship  married  again. 

The  next  chapter  begins  naturally  as  follows :  "I  trust 
nobody  will  suppose,  from  the  events  described  in  the  last 
chapter,  that  our  friend  Ivanhoe  is  really  dead."  He  is  of 
course  cured  of  his  wounds,  though  they  take  six  years  in 
the  curing.  And  then  he  makes  his  way  bach  to  Kother- 
wood,  in  a  friar's  disguise,  much  as  he  did  on  that  former 

^  I  doubt  that  Thackeray  did  not  write  the  Latin  epitaph,  but  I 
hardly  dare  suggest  the  name  of  any  author.  The  "vixit  avidus" 
is  quite  worthy  of  Thackeray;  but  had  he  tried  his  hand  at  such 
mode  of  expression  he  would  have  done  more  of  it.  I  should  like  to 
know  whether  he  had  been  in  company  with  Father  Prout  at  the  time. 


146  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

occasion  when  wo  first  mot  liim,  and  there  is  received  by 
Athelstane  and  Rowena — and  their  boy  ! — while  Wamba 
sings  him  a  song : 

Then  you  know  the  worth  of  a  lass, 
Once  you  have  come  to  forty  year ! 

No  one^  of  course,  but  Wamba  knows  Ivanhoo,  who 
roams  about  the  country,  melancholy  —  as  he  of  course 
would  be — charitable — as  he  perhaps  might  be — for  we 
are  specially  told  that  he  had  a  large  fortune  and  nothing 
to  do  with  it,  and  slaying  robbers  wherever  he  met  them — 
but  sad  at  heart  all  the  time.  Then  there  comes  a  little 
burst  of  the  author's  own  feelings,  while  he  is  burlesquing. 
"Ah  my  dear  friends  and  British  public,  are  there  not  oth- 
ers who  are  melancholy  under  a  mask  of  gaiety,  and  who 
in  the  midst  of  crowds  are  lonely  ?  Liston  was  a  most 
melancholy  man ;  Grimaldi  had  feelings  ;  and  then  others 
I  wot  of.  But  psha ! — let  us  have  the  next  chapter."  In 
all  of  which  there  was  a  touch  of  earnestness. 

Ivanhoe's  griefs  were  enhanced  by  the  wickedness  of 
King  John,  under  whom  he  would  not  serve.  "  It  was  Sir 
Wilfrid  of  Ivanhoe,  I  need  scarcely  say,  who  got  the  Bar^ 
ons  of  Eno-land  to  leao;ue  to2:ether  and  extort  from  the 
king  that  famous  instrument  and  palladium  of  our  liber- 
ties, at  present  in  the  British  Museum,  Great  Russell  Street, 
Bloomsbury — The  Magna  Charta."  Athelstane  also  quar- 
rels with  the  king,  wdiose  orders  he  disobeys,  and  Rother- 
wood  is  attacked  by  the  royal  army.  No  one  was  of  real 
service  in  the  way  of  fighting  except  Ivanhoe — and  how 
could  he  take  up  that  cause  ?  "  No ;  be  hanged  to  me," 
said  the  knight,  bitterly.  "This  is  a  quarrel  in  which  I 
can't  interfere.  Common  politeness  forbids.  Let  yonder 
ale-swilling  Athelstane  defend  his  —  ha,  ha! — wife;  and 


VI.]  THACKERAY'S  BURLESQUES.  147 

my  Lady  Rowena  guard  her  —  ha,  ha! — sonr  and  he 
laughed  wildly  and  madly. 

But  Athelstane  is  killed— this  time  in  earnest — and  then 
Ivanhoe  rushes  to  the  rescue.  He  finds  Gurth  dead  at  the 
park-lodge ;  and  though  he  is  ail  alone — having  out  ridden 
his  followers  —  he  rushes  up  the  chestnut  avenue  to  the 
housed  which  is  being  attacked.  "  An  Ivanhoe !  an  Ivan- 
hoe !"  he  bellowed  out  with  a  shout  that  overcame  all  the 
din  of  battle ; — "  Notre  Dame  a  la  recousse !"  and  to  hurl 
his  lance  through  the  midriff  of  Reginald  de  Bracy,  who 
was  commanding  the  assault — who  fell  howling  with  an- 
guish— to  wave  his  battle-axe  over  his  own  head,  and  to 
cut  off  those  of  thirteen  men-at-arms,  was  the  work  of  an 
instant.  "An  Ivanhoe!  an  Ivanhoe!"  he  still  shouted, 
and  down  went  a  man  as  sure  as  he  said  "  hoe !" 

Nevertheless  he  is  again  killed  by  multitudes,  or  very 
nearly — and  has  again  to  be  cured  by  the  tender  nursing 
of  Wamba.  But  Athelstane  is  really  dead,  and  Rowena 
and  the  boy  have  to  be  found.  He  does  his  duty  and 
finds  them — just  in  time  to  be  present  at  Rowena's  death. 
She  has  been  put  in  prison  by  King  John,  and  is  in  ex- 
tremis when  her  first  husband  gets  to  her.  "  Wilfrid,  my 
early  loved,"^  slowly  gasped  she,  removing  her  gray  hair 
from  her  furrowed  temples,  and  gazing  on  her  boy  fondly 
as  he  nestled  on  Ivanhoe's  knee — "  promise  me  by  St.  Wal- 
theof  of  Templestowe — promise  me  one  boon  !" 

"I  do,"  said  Ivanhoe,  clasping  the  boy,  and  thinking 
that  it  was  to  that  little  innocent  that  the  promise  was 
intended  to  apply. 

*  There  is  something  almost  illnatured  in  his  treatment  of  Rowena, 
who  is  very  false  in  her  declarations  of  love ; — and  it  is  to  be  feared 
that  by  Rowena  the  author  iutcnds  the  normal  married  lady  of  Eng- 
lish society. 


148  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

''By  St.AValtheof?" 

"By  StAValtlieof!" 

"  Promise  me,  then,"  gasped  Rowena,  staring  wildly  at 
him,  "  that  you  will  never  marry  a  Jewess  1" 

"By  St.  Waltheof!"  cried  Ivanhoe,  "but  this  is  too 
much,"  and  he  did  not  make  the  promise. 

"Having  placed  young  Cedric  at  school  at  the  Hall  of 
Dotheboys,  in  Yorkshire,  and  arranged  his  family  affairs. 
Sir  Wilfrid  of  Ivanhoe  quitted  a  country  which  had  no 
longer  any  charm  for  him,  as  there  was  no  fighting  to  be 
done,  and  in  which  his  stay  was  rendered  less  agreeable 
by  the  notion  that  King  John  would  hang  him."  So  he 
goes  forth  and  fights  again,  in  league  with  the  Knights  of 
St.  John — the  Templars  naturally  having  a  dislike  to  him 
because  of  Brian  de  Bois  Guilbert.  "  The  only  fault  that 
the  great  and  gallant,  though  severe  and  ascetic  Folko  of 
Heydenbraten,  the  chief  of  the  Order  of  St.  John,  found 
with  the  melancholy  warrior  whose  lance  did  such  service 
to  the  cause,  was  that  he  did  not  persecute  the  Jews  as 
so  religious  a  knight  should.  So  the  Jews,  in  cursing  the 
Christians,  always  excepted  the  name  of  the  Desdichado 
— or  the  double  disinherited,  as  he  now  was  —  the  Des- 
dichado Doblado."  Then  came  the  battle  of  Alarcos,  and 
the  Moors  were  all  but  in  possession  of  the  whole  of 
Spain.  Sir  Wilfrid,  like  other  good  Christians,  cannot  en- 
dure this,  so  he  takes  ship  in  Bohemia,  where  he  happens 
to  be  quartered,  and  has  himself  carried  to  Barcelona,  and 
proceeds  "  to  slaughter  the  Moors  forthwith."  Then  there 
is  a  scene  in  which  Isaac  of  York  comes  on  as  a  messen- 
ger, to  ransom  from  a  Spanish  knight,  Don  Bcltram  de 
Cuchilla  y  Trabuco,  y  Espada,  y  Espelon,  a  little  Moorish 
girl.  The  Spanish  knight  of  course  murders  the  little  girl 
instead  of  takinir  the   ransom.     Two  hundred  thousand 


VI.]  THACKERAY'S  BURLESQUES.  149 

dirhems  arc  offered,  however  much  that  may  be ;  but  the 
knight,  who  happens  to  be  in  funds  at  the  time,  prefers  to 
kill  the  little  girl.  All  this  is  only  necessary  to  the  story 
as  introducing  Isaac  of  York.  Sir  Wilfrid  is  of  course 
intent  upon  finding  Rebecca.  Through  all  his  troubles 
and  triumphs,  from  his  gaining  and  his  losing  of  Row- 
ena,  from  the  day  on  which  he  had  been  "  locked  wp  with 
the  Jewess  in  the  tower^''  he  had  always  been  true  to  her. 
"Away  from  me!"  said  the  old  Jew,  tottering.  "Away, 
Rebecca  is  —  dead!"  Then  Ivanhoe  goes  out  and  kills 
fifty  thousand  Moors,  and  there  is  the  picture  of  him — 
killing  them. 

But  Rebecca  is  not  dead  at  all.  Her  father  had  said 
so  because  Rebecca  had  behaved  very  badly  to  him.  She 
had  refused  to  marry  the  Moorish  prince,  or  any  of  her 
own  people,  the  Jews,  and  had  gone  as  far  as  to  declare 
her  passion  for  Ivanhoe  and  her  resolution  to  be  a 
Christian.  All  the  Jews  and  Jewesses  in  Valencia  turned 
against  her — so  that  she  was  locked  up  in  the  back-kitchen 
and  almost  starved  to  death.  But  Ivanhoe  found  her,  of 
course,  and  makes  her  Mrs.  Ivanhoe,  or  Lady  Wilfrid  the 
second.  Then  Thackeray  tells  us  how  for  many  years  he, 
Thackeray,  had  not  ceased  to  feel  that  it  ought  to  be  so. 
"  Indeed  I  have  thought  of  it  any  time  these  five-and-twen- 
ty  years — ever  since,  as  a  boy  at  school,  I  commenced  the 
noble  study  of  novels — ever  since  the  day  when,  lying  on 
sunny  slopes,  of  half-holidays,  the  fair  chivalrous  figures 
and  beautiful  shapes  of  knights  and  ladies  were  visible  to 
me,  ever  since  I  grew  to  love  Rebecca,  that  sweetest  creat- 
ure of  the  poet's  fancy,  and  longed  to  see  her  righted." 

And  so,  no  doubt,  it  had  been.  The  very  burlesque 
had  grown  from  the  way  in  which  his  young  imagination 
bad  been  moved  by  Scott's  romance.     lie  had  felt,  from 


150  THACKERAY.  [chap.  vi. 

tlie  time  of  those  happy  half-holidays  in  which  he  had 
been  lucky  enough  to  get  hold  of  the  novel,  that  according 
to  all  laws  of  poetic  justice,  Rebecca,  as  being  the  more 
beautiful  and  the  more  interesting  of  the  heroines,  was 
entitled  to  the  possession  of  the  hero.  We  have  all  of 
us  felt  the  same.  But  to  him  had  been  present  at  the 
same  time  all  that  is  ludicrous  in  our  ideas  of  middle-age 
chivalry ;  the  absurdity  of  its  recorded  deeds,  the  blood- 
thirstiness  of  its  recreations,  the  selfishness  of  its  men,  the 
falseness  of  its  honour,  the  cringing  of  its  loyalty,  the 
tyranny  of  its  princes.  And  so  there  came  forth  Rebecca 
and  Rowena,  all  broad  fun  from  beginning  to  end,  but 
never  without  a  purpose — the  best  burlesque,  as  I  think, 
in  our  language. 


CHAPTER  Vn. 

Thackeray's  lectures. 

In  speaking  of  Thackeray's  life,  I  have  said  why  and  how 
it  was  that  he  took  upon  himself  to  lecture,  and  have  also 
told  the  reader  that  he  was  altogether  successful  in  carry- 
ing out  the  views  proposed  to  himself.  Of  his  peculiar 
manner  of  lecturing  I  have  said  but  little,  never  having 
heard  him.  "He  pounded  along — very  clearly,"  I  have 
been  told ;  from  which  I  surmise  that  there  was  no  special 
grace  of  eloquence,  but  that  he  was  always  audible.  I 
cannot  imagine  that  he  should  have  been  ever  eloquent. 
He  could  not  have  taken  the  trouble  necessary  with  his 
voice,  with  his  cadences,  or  with  his  outward  appearance. 
I  imagine  that  they  who  seem  so  naturally  to  fall  into  the 
proprieties  of  elocution  have  generally  taken  a  great  deal 
of  trouble  beyond  that  which  the  mere  finding  of  their 
words  has  cost  them.  It  is  clearly  to  the  matter  of  what 
he  then  gave  the  world,  and  not  to  the  manner,  that  we 
must  look  for  what  interest  is  to  be  found  in  the  lectures. 
Those  on  The  English  Humorists  were  given  first. 
The  second  set  was  on  The  Four  Georges.  In  the  vol- 
ume now  before  us  The  Georges  are  printed  first,  and  the 
whole  is  produced  simply  as  a  part  of  Thackeray's  literary 
work.  Looked  at,  however,  in  that  light,  the  merit  of  the 
two  sets  of  biographical  essays  is  very  different.     In  the 


152  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

one  "we  Lave  all  the  anecdotes  wliicli  could  be  brought  to- 
gether respecting  four  of  our  kings  —  who  as  men  were 
not  peculiar,  though  their  reigns  were,  and  will  always  be, 
famous,  because  the  country  during  the  period  was  in- 
creasing greatly  in  prosperity,  and  was  ever  strengthening 
the  hold  it  had  upon  its  liberties.  In  the  other  set  the 
lecturer  was  a  man  of  letters  dealing  with  men  of  letters, 
and  himself  a  prince  among  humorists  is  dealing  with  the 
humorists  of  his  own  country  and  language.  One  could 
not  imagine  a  better  subject  for  such  discourses  from 
Thackeray's  mouth  than  the  latter.  The  former  was  not, 
I  think,  so  good. 

In  discussing  the  lives  of  kings  the  biographer  may 
trust  to  personal  details  or  to  historical  facts.  He  may 
take  the  man,  and  say  what  good  or  evil  may  be  said  of 
him  as  a  man ; — or  he  may  take  the  period,  and  tell  his 
readers  what  happened  to  the  country  while  this  or  the 
other  king  was  on  the  throne.  In  the  case  with  which 
we  are  dealing,  the  lecturer  had  not  time  enough  or  room 
enough  for  real  history.  His  object  was  to  let  his  audi- 
ence know  of  what  nature  were  the  men  ;  and  we  are  bound 
to  say  that  the  pictures  have  not,  on  the  whole,  been  flat- 
tering. It  was  almost  necessary  that  with  such  a  subject 
such  should  be  the  result.  A  story  of  family  virtues,  with 
princes  and  princesses  well  brought  up,  with  happy  family 
relations,  all  couleur  de  rose  —  as  it  would  of  course  be- 
come us  to  write  if  we  were  dealing  with  the  life  of  a 
living  sovereign — would  not  be  interesting.  No  one  on 
going  to  hear  Thackeray  lecture  on  the  Georges  expected 
that.  There  must  be  some  piquancy  given,  or  the  lecture 
would  be  dull ; — and  the  eulogy  of  personal  virtues  can  sel- 
dom be  piquant.  It  is  difllcult  to  speak  fittingly  of  a  sov- 
ereign, either  living  or  not,  long  since  gone.     You  can 


VII.]  THACKERAY'S  LECTURES.  153 

hardly  praise  sucli  a  one  without  flattery.  You  can  hardly 
censure  him  without  injustice.  We  are  either  ignorant  of 
his  personal  doings  or  "we  know  them  as  secrets,  which 
have  heen  divulged  for  the  most  part  either  falsely  or 
treacherously  —  often  both  falsely  and  treacherously.  It 
is  better,  perhaps,  that  we  should  not  deal  with  the  person- 
alities of  princes. 

I  believe  that  Thacteray  fancied  that  he  had  spoken 
well  of  George  III.,  and  am  sure  that  it  w^as  his  intention 
to  do  so.  But  the  impression  he  leaves  is  poor.  "  He  is 
said  not  to  hav^e  cared  for  Shakespeare  or  tragedy  much ; 
farces  and  pantomimes  were  his  joy ; — and  especially  when 
clown  swallowed  a  carrot  or  a  string  of  sausages,  he  would 
laugh  so  outrageously  that  the  lovely  princess  by  his  side 
would  have  to  say,  'My  gracious  monarch,  do  compose 
yourself.'  '  George,  be  a  king !'  were  the  words  which 
she  " — his  mother — "  was  ever  croaking  in  the  ears  of  her 
son ;  and  a  king  the  simple,  stubborn,  affectionate,  bigoted 
man  tried  to  be."  "He  did  his  best;  he  w^orked  accord- 
ing to  his  lights ;  what  virtues  he  knew  he  tried  to  prac- 
tise; what  knowledge  he  could  master  he  strove  to  ac- 
quire." If  the  lectures  were  to  be  popular,  it  was  abso- 
lutely necessary  that  they  should  be  written  in  this  strain. 
A  lecture  simply  laudatory  on  the  life  of  St.  Paul  would 
not  draw  even  the  bench  of  bishops  to  listen  to  it ;  but 
were  a  flaw  found  in  the  apostle's  life,  the  whole  Church 
of  Enofland. would  be  bound  to  know  all  about  it.  I  am 
quite  sure  that  Thackeray  believed  every  word  that  he  said 
in  the  lectures,  and  that  he  intended  to  put  in  the  good 
and  the  bad,  honestly,  as  they  might  come  to  his  hand. 
We  may  be  quite  sure  that  he  did  not  intend  to  flatter  the 
royal  family ; — equally  sure  that  he  would  not  calumniate. 
There  were,  however,  so  many  difficulties  to  be  encounter' 


164=  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

od  that  I  cannot  but  think  tliat  the  subject  was  ill-chosen. 
In  makinof  them  so  amusinjj  as  he  did,  and  so  little  offen- 
sive,  great  ingenuity  was  shown. 

I  will  now  go  back  to  the  fii*st  series,  in  wliich  the  lect- 
urer treated  of  Swift,  Congreve,  Addison,  Steele,  Prior, 
Gay,  Pope,  Hogarth,  Smollett,  Fielding,  Sterne,  and  Gold- 
smith. All  these  Thackeray  has  put  in  their  proper  order, 
placing  the  men  from  the  date  of  their  birth,  except  Prior, 
who  was  in  truth  the  eldest  of  the  ]ot,  but  whom  it  was 
necessary  to  depose,  in  order  that  the  great  Swift  might 
stand  first  on  the  list,  and  Smollett,  who  was  not  born  till 
fourteen  yeai-s  after  Fielding,  eight  years  after  Sterne,  and 
who  has  been  moved  up,  I  presume,  simply  from  caprice, 
li'rom  the  birth  of  the  first  to  the  death  of  the  last,  was  a 
period  of  nearly  a  hundred  yoars.  They  were  never  abso- 
lutely all  alive  together ;  b  it  it  was  nearly  so,  Addison 
and  Prior  having  died  before  Smollett  was  born.  AVhetlv- 
er  we  should  accept  as  humorists  the  full  catalogue,  may 
be  a  question ;  though  we  shall  hardly  wish  to  eliminate 
any  one  from  such  a  dozen  of  names.  Pope  we  should 
hardly  define  as  a  humorist,  were  we  to  be  seeking  for  a 
definition  specially  fit  for  him,  though  we  shall  certainly 
not  deny  the  gift  of  humour  to  the  author  of  The  Bape  of 
the  Lock,  or  to  the  translator  of  any  portion  of  The  Odys- 
sey. Nor  should  we  have  included  Fielding  or  Smollett, 
in  spite  of  Parson  Adams  and  Tabitha  Bramble,  unless 
anxious  to  fill  a  good  company.  That  Hogarth  was  spe- 
cially a  humorist  no  one  will  deny;  but  in  speaking  of 
humorists  we  should  have  presumed,  unless  otherwise  no- 
tified, that  humorists  in  letters  only  liad  been  intended. 
As  Thackeray  explains  clearly  what  he  means  by  a  hu- 
morist, I  may  as  well  here  repeat  the  passage :  "  If  hu- 
mour only  meant  laughter,  you  would  scarcely  feel  more 


VII.]  THACKERAY'S  LECTURES.  155 

interest  about  humorous  writers  than  about  the  private 
life  of  poor  Harlequin  just  mentioned,  who  possesses  in 
common  with  these  the  power  of  making  you  laugh.  But 
the  men  regarding  whose  lives  and  stories  your  kind  pres- 
ence here  shows  that  you  have  curiosity  and  sympathy, 
appeal  to  a  great  number  of  our  other  faculties,  besides 
our  mere  sense  of  ridicule.  The  humorous  writer  pro- 
fesses to  awaken  and  direct  your  love,  your  pity,  your 
kindness — your  scorn  for  untruth,  pretension,  imposture — 
your  tenderness  for  the  weak,  the  poor,  the  oppressed,  the 
unhappy.  To  the  best  of  his  means  and  ability  he  com- 
ments on  all  the  ordinary  actions  and  passions  of  life  al- 
most. He  takes  upon  himself  to  be  the  week-day  preach- 
er, so  to  speak.  Accordingly,  as  he  finds,  and  speaks,  and 
feels  the  truth  best,  we  regard  him,  esteem  him — some- 
times love  him.  And  as  his  business  is  to  mark  other 
people's  lives  and  peculiarities,  we  moralise  upon  his  life 
when  he  is  gone — and  yesterday's  preacher  becomes  the 
text  for  to-day's  sermon." 

Having  thus  explained  his  purpose,  Thackeray  begins 
his  task,  and  puts  Swift  in  his  front  rank  as  a  humorist. 
The  picture  given  of  this  great  man  has  very  manifestly 
the  look  of  truth,  and  if  true,  is  terrible  indeed.  We  do, 
in  fact,  know  it  to  be  true — even  though  it  be  admitted 
that  there  is  still  room  left  for  a  book  to  be  written  on 
the  life  of  the  fearful  dean.  Here  was  a  man  endued  with 
an  intellect  pellucid  as  well  as  brilliant ;  who  could  not 
only  conceive  but  see  also — with  some  fine  instincts  too ; 
whom  fortune  did  not  flout ;  whom  circumstances  fairly 
served ;  but  who,  from  first  to  last,  was  miserable  himself, 
who  made  others  miserable,  and  who  deserved  misery. 
Our  business,  during  the  page  or  two  which  we  can  give 
to  the  subject,  is  not  with  Swift,  but  with  Thackeray's 


156  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

picture  of  Swift.  It  is  painted  witli  colours  terribly  strong 
and  with  shadows  fearfully  deep.  "  Would  you  like  to 
have  lived  with  him?"  Thackeray  asks.  Then  he  says 
how  pleasant  it  would  have  been  to  have  passed  some  time 
with  Fielding,  Johnson,  or  Goldsmith.  "  I  should  like 
to  have  been  Shakespeare's  shoeblack,"  he  says.  *'But 
Swift !  If  you  had  been  his  inferior  in  parts — and  that, 
with  a  great  respect  for  all  persons  present,  I  fear  is  only 
very  likely  —  his  equal  in  mere  social  station,  he  would 
have  bullied,  scorned,  and  insulted  you.  If,  undeterred 
by  his  great  reputation,  you  had  met  him  like  a  man,  he 
would  have  quailed  before  you  and  not  had  the  pluck  to 
reply — and  gone  home,  and  years  after  written  a  foul  epi- 
gram upon  you."  There  is  a  picture !  "  If  you  had  been 
a  lord  with  a  blue  riband,  who  flattered  his  vanity,  or  could 
help  his  ambition,  he  would  have  been  the  most  delightful 
company  in  the  world.  .  .  .  How  he  would  have  torn  your 
enemies  to  pieces  for  you,  and  made  fun  of  the  Opposition  ! 
llis  servility  was  so  boisterous  that  it  looked  like  inde- 
pendence." lie  was  a  man  whose  mind  was  never  fixed 
on  high  things,  but  was  striving  always  after  something 
which,  little  as  it  might  be,  and  successful  as  he  was, 
should  always  be  out  of  his  reach.  It  had  been  his  mis- 
fortune to  become  a  clergyman,  because  the  way  to  church 
preferment  seemed  to  be  the  readiest.  He  became,  as  we 
all  know,  a  dean — but  never  a  bishop,  and  was  therefore 
wretched.  Thackeray  describes  him  as  a  clerical  highway- 
man, seizing  on  all  he  could  get.  But  "  the  great  prize 
has  not  yet  come.  The  coach  with  the  mitre  and  crozier 
in  it,  which  he  intends  to  have  for  his  share,  has  been 
delayed  on  the  way  from  St.  James's ;  and  he  waits  and 
waits  till  nightfall,  when  his  runners  come  and  tell  him 
that  the  coach  has  taken  a  different  way  and  escaped  him. 


VII.J  THACKERAY'S  LECTURES.  157 

So  he  fires  bis  pistol  into  the  air  with  a  curse,  and  rides 
away  into  his  own  country ;" — or,  in  other  words,  takes  a 
poor  deanery  in  Ireland. 

Thackeray  explains  very  correctly,  as  I  think,  the  nature 
of  the  weapons  which  the  man  used — namely,  the  words 
and  style  with  which  he  wrote.  "  That  Swift  was  born  at 
No.  7,  Hoey's  Court,  Dublin,  on  November  30,  1667,  is  a 
certain  fact,  of  which  nobody  will  deny  the  sister -island 
the  honour  and  glory ;  but  it  seems  to  me  he  was  no  more 
an  Irishman  than  a  man  born  of  English  parents  at  Cal- 
cutta is  a  Hindoo.  Goldsmith  was  an  Irishman,  and  al- 
ways an  Irishman ;  Steele  was  an  Irishman,  and  always  an 
Irishman.;  Swift's  heart  was  English  and  in  England,  his 
habits  English,  his  logic  eminently  English  ;  liis  statement 
is  elaborately  simple ;  he  shuns  tropes  and  metaphors,  and 
uses  his  ideas  and  words  with  a  wise  thrift  and  economy, 
as  he  used  his  money ; — with  which  he  could  be  gener- 
ous and  splendid  upon  great  occasions,  but  which  he  hus- 
banded when  there  was  no  need  to  spend  it.  He  never  in- 
dulges in  needless  extravagance  of  rhetoric,  lavish  epithets, 
profuse  imagery.  He  lays  his  opinions  before  you  with  a 
grave  simplicity  and  a  perfect  neatness."  This  is  quite 
true  of  him,  and  the  result  is  that  though  you  may  deny 
him  sincerity,  simplicity,  humanity,  or  good  taste,  you  can 
hardly  find  fault  with  his  language. 

Swift  was  a  clergyman,  and  this  is  what  Thackeray  says 
of  him  in  regard  to  his  sacred  profession.  "  I  know  of 
few  things  more  conclusiv^e  as  to  the  sincerity  of  Swift's 
religion,  than  his  advice  to  poor  John  Gay  to  turn  clergy- 
man, and  look  out  for  a  seat  on  the  Bench  !  Gay,  the  au- 
thor of  The  Beggar'' s  Opera;  Gay,  the  wildest  of  the  wits 
about  town !  It  was  this  man  that  Jonathan  Swift  ad- 
vised to  take  orders,  to  mount  in  a  cassock  and  bands — • 


158  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

just  as  lie  advised  Lim  to  husband  his  shillings,  and  put 
his  thousand  pounds  out  to  interest." 

It  was  not  that  he  was  without  religion — or  without, 
rather,  his  religious  beliefs  and  doubts,  "  for  Swift,"  says 
Thackeray,  "  was  a  reverent,  was  a  pious  spirit.  For  Swift 
could  love  and  could  pray."  Left  to  himself  and  to  the 
natural  thoughts  of  his  mind,  without  those  "  orders  "  to 
which  he  had  bound  himself  as  a  necessary  part  of  his 
trade,  he  could  have  turned  to  his  God  with  questionings 
which  need  not  then  have  been  heartbreaking.  "  It  is  my 
belief,"  says  Thackeray,  "  that  he  suffered  frightfully  from 
the  consciousness  of  his  own  scepticism,  and  that  he  had 
bent  his  pride  so  far  down  as  to  put  his  apostasy  out  to 
hire."  I  doubt  whether  any  of  Swift's  works  are  very 
much  read  now,  but  perhaps  Gulliver's  travels  are  oftener 
in  the  hands  of  modern  readers  than  any  other.  Of  all 
the  satires  in  our  language,  it  is  probably  the  most  cynical, 
the  most  absolutely  illnatured,  and  therefore  the  falsest. 
Let  those  who  care  to  form  an  opinion  of  Swift's  mind 
from  the  best  known  of  his  works,  turn  to  Thackeray's 
account  of  Gulliver.  I  can  imagine  no  greater  proof  of 
misery  than  to  have  been  able  to  write  such  a  book  as  that. 

It  is  thus  that  the  lecturer  concludes  his  lecture  about 
Swift:  "lie  shrank  away  from  all  affections  sooner  or 
later.  Stella  and  Vanessa  both  died  near  him,  and  away 
from  him.  He  had  not  heart  enough  to  sec  them  die. 
He  broke  from  his  fastest  friend,  Sheridan.  He  slunk 
away  from  his  fondest  admirer.  Pope.  His  laugh  jnrs  on 
one's  ear  after  seven-score  years.  He  was  always  alone — 
alone  and  gnashing  in  the  darkness,  except  when  Stella's 
sweet  smile  came  and  shone  on  him.  When  that  went, 
silence  and  utter  night  closed  over  him.  An  immense 
genius,  an  awful  downfall  and  ruin  !     So  great  a  man  he 


vn.]  THACKERAY'S  LECTURES.  159 

seems  to  me,  that  thinkini^  of  him  is  like  thinking  of  an 
empire  falling.  We  have  other  great  names  to  mention — 
none,  I  think,  however,  so  great  or  so  gloomy."  And  so 
we  pass  on  from  Swift,  feeling  that  though  the  man  was 
certainly  a  humorist,  we  have  had  as  yet  but  little  to  do 
with  humour. 

Congreve  is  the  next  who,  however  truly  he  may  have 
been  a  humorist,  is  described  here  rather  as  a  man  of 
fashion.  A  man  of  fashion  he  certainly  was,  but  is  best 
known  in  our  literature  as  a  comedian — worshipping  that 
Comic  Muse  to  whom  Thackeray  hesitates  to  introduce  his 
audience,  because  she  is  not  only  merry,  but  shameless  also. 
Congreve's  muse  was  about  as  bad  as  any  muse  that  ever 
misbehaved  herself — and  I  think,  as  little  amusing.  "  Read- 
ing in  these  plays  now,"  says  Thackeray,  "  is  like  shutting 
your  ears  and  looking  at  people  dancing.  What  does  it 
mean  ? — the  measures,  the  grimaces,  the  bowing,  shuffling, 
and  retreating,  the  cavaliers  seul  advancing  upon  those  la- 
dies— those  ladies  and  men  twirling  round  at  the  end  in 
a  mad  galop,  after  which  everybody  bows  and  the  quaint 
rite  is  celebrated  ?"  It  is  always  so  with  Congreve's  plays, 
and  Etherege's  and  Wycherley's.  The  world  we  meet 
there  is  not  our  world,  and  as  we  read  the  plays  we  have 
no  sympathy  with  these  unknown  people.  It  was  not 
that  they  lived  so  long  ago.  They  are  much  nearer  to  us 
in  time  than  the  men  and  women  who  ficjured  on  the 
stage  in  the  reign  of  James  I.  But  their  nature  is  farther 
from  our  nature.  They  sparkle,  but  never  warm.  They 
are  witty,  but  leave  no  impression.  I  might  almost  go 
further,  and  say  that  they  are  wicked,  but  never  allure. 
"  When  Voltaire  came  to  visit  the  great  Congreve,"  says 
Thackeray,  "  the  latter  rather  affected  to  despise  his  liter- 
ary reputation ;  and  in  this,  perhaps,  the  great  Congreve 


160  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

was  not  far  wrong.  A  touch  of  Steele's  tenderness  is 
worth  all  his  finery ;  a  flash  of  Swift's  lightning,  a  beam 
of  Addison's  pure  sunshine,  and  his  tawdry  playhouse 
taper  is  invisible.  But  the  ladies  loved  him,  and  he  was 
undoubtedly  a  pretty  fellow.'^ 

There  is  no  doubt  as  to  the  true  humour  of  Addison, 
wh.o  next  comes  up  before  us,  but  I  think  that  he  makes 
hardly  so  good  a  subject  for  a  lecturer  as  the  great 
gloomy  man  of  intellect,  or  the  frivolous  man  of  pleasure. 
Thackeray  tells  us  all  that  is  to  be  said  about  him  as  a 
humorist  in  so  few  lines  that  I  may  almost  insert  them  on 
this  page :  "But  it  is  not  for  his  reputation  as  the  great 
author  of  Cato  and  The  Campaign,  or  for  his  merits  as 
Secretary  of  State,  or  for  his  rank  and  high  distinction  as 
Lady  Warwick's  husband,  or  for  his  eminence  as  an  ex- 
aminer of  political  questions  on  the  Whig  side,  or  a  guar- 
dian of  British  liberties,  that  we  admire  Joseph  Addison. 
It  is  as  a  Tattler  of  small  talk  and  a  Spectator  of  mankind 
that  we  cherish  and  love  him,  and  owe  as  much  pleasure 
to  him  as  to  any  human  being  that  ever  wrote,  lie  came 
in  that  artificial  age,  and  began  to  speak  with  his  noble 
natural  voice.  He  came  the  gentle  satirist,  who  hit  no  un- 
fair blow ;  the  kind  judge,  who  castigated  only  in  smiling. 
While  Swift  went  about  hanging  and  ruthless,  a  literary 
Jeffreys,  in  Addison's  kind  court  only  minor  cases  were 
tried ;  —  only  peccadilloes  and  small  sins  against  society, 
only  a  dangerous  libertinism  in  tuckers  and  hoops,  or  a 
nuisance  in  the  abuse  of  beaux  canes  and  snuffboxes." 
Steele  set  The  Taller  a-going.  "But  with  his  friend's 
discovery  of  The  Taller,  Addison's  calling  was  found,  and 
the  most  delightful  Tattler  in  the  world  began  to  speak. 
He  does  not  go  very  deep.  Let  gentlemen  of  a  profound 
genius,  critics  accustomed  to  the  plunge  of  the  bathes,  con- 


vn.l  THACKERAY'S  LECTURES.  161 

sole  themselves  by  thinking  that  he  couldn't  go  very  deep. 
There  is  no  trace  of  suffering  in  his  writing.  He  was  so 
good,  so  honest,  so  healthy,  so  cheerfully  selfish — if  I  must 
use  the  word !" 

Such  was  Addison  as  a  humorist ;  and  when'  the  hearer 
shall  have  heard  also — or  the  reader  read — that  this  most 
charming  Tattler  also  wrote  Cato,  became  a  Secretary  of 
State,  and  mamcd  a  countess,  he  will  have  learned  all  that 
Thackeray  had  to  tell  of  him. 

Steele  was  one  who  stood  much  less  high  in  the  world's 
esteem,  and  who  left  behind  him  a  much  smaller  name — 
but  was  quite  Addison's  equal  as  a  humorist  and  a  wit. 
Addison,  though  he  had  the  reputation  of  a  toper,  was  re- 
spectability itself.  Steele  was  almost  always  disreputable. 
He  was  brought  from  Ireland,  placed  at  the  Charter  House, 
and  then  transferred  to  Oxford,  where  he  became  acquaint- 
ed with  Addison.  Thackeray  says  that  "  Steele  found  Ad- 
dison a  stately  college  don  at  Oxford."  The  stateliness 
and  the  don's  rank  were  attributable  no  doubt  to  the  more 
sober  character  of  the  English  lad,  for,  in  fact,  the  two 
men  were  born  in  the  same  year,  1672.  Steele,  who  during 
his  life  was  affected  by  various  different  tastes,  first  turned 
himself  to  literature,  but  early  in  life  was  bitten  by  the  hue 
of  a  red  coat  and  became  a  trooper  in  the  Horse  Guards. 
To  the  end  he  vacillated  in  the  same  way.  In  that  charm- 
ing paper  in  The  Tatler,  in  which  he  records  his  father's 
death,  his  mother's  griefs,  his  own  most  solemn  and  ten- 
der emotions,  he  says  he  is  interrupted  by  the  arrival  of  a 
hamper  of  wine,  *  the  same  as  is  to  be  sold  at  Garraway's 
next  week ;'  upon  the  receipt  of  which  he  sends  for  three 
friends,  and  they  fall  to  instantly,  drinking  two  bottles 
apiece,  with  great  benefit  to  themselves,  and  not  separating 
till  two  o'clock  in  the  morninir." 


162  TmVCKERAY.  [chap. 

He  had  two  wives,  whom  he  loved  dearly  and  treated 
badly.  lie  hired  grand  houses,  and  bought  line  horses  for 
which  he  could  never  pay.  He  was  often  religious,  but 
more  often  drunk.  As  a  man  of  letters,  other  men  of  let- 
ters who  followed  him,  such  as  Thackeray,  could  not  be 
very  proud  of  him.  But  everybody  loved  him ;  and  he 
seems  to  have  been  the  inventor  of  that  flying  literature 
which,  with  many  changes  in  form  and  manner,  has  done 
so  much  for  the  amusement  and  edification  of  readers  ever 
since  his  time.  He  was  always  commencing,  or  carrying 
on — often  editing — some  one  of  the  numerous  periodicals 
which  appeared  during  his  time.  Thackeray  mentions 
seven  :  The  Taller^  The  Sinctator^  The  Guardian,  The  Eng- 
lishman, The  Lovcr^  The  Reader,  and  Tlie  Theatre ;  that 
three  of  them  are  well  known  to  this  day — the  three  first 
named — and  are  to  be  found  in  all  libraries,  is  proof  that 
his  life  was  not  thrown  away. 

I  almost  question  Prior's  right  to  be  in  the  list,  unless, 
indeed,  the  mastery  over  well-turned  conceits  is  to  be  in- 
cluded within  the  border  of  humour.  But  Thackeray  had 
a  strong  liking  for  Prior,  and  in  his  own  humorous  way 
rebukes  his  audience  for  not  being  familiar  with  The  Town 
and  Country  Mouse.  He  says  that  Prior's  epigrams  have 
the  genuine  sparkle,  and  compares  Prior  to  Horace.  "  His 
song,  his  philosophy,  his  good  sense,  his  happy,  easy  turns 
and  melody,  his  loves  and  his  epicureanism,  bear  a  great 
resemblance  to  that  most  delightful  and  accomplished  mas- 
ter." I  cannot  say  that  I  agree  with  this.  Prior  is  gen- 
erally neat  in  his  expression.  Horace  is  happy — which  is 
surely  a  great  deal  more.     . 

All  that  is  said  of  Gay,  Pope,  Hogarth,  Smollett,  and 
Fielding  is  worth  reading,  and  may  be  of  great  value  both 
to  those  who  have  not  time  to  study  the  authors,  and  to 


VII.]  THACKERAY'S  LECTURES.  163 

those  who  desire  to  have  their  own  judgments  somewhat 
guided,  somewhat  assisted.  That  they  were  all  men  of 
humour  there  can  be  no  doubt.  AVhether  either  of  them, 
except  perhaps  Gay,  Avould  have  been  specially  ranked  as 
a  humorist  among  men  of  letters,  may  be  a  question.  * 

Sterne  was  a  humorist,  and  employed  his  pen  in  that 
line,  if  ever  a  writer  did  so,  and  so  was  Goldsmith.  Of 
the  excellence  and  largeness  of  the  disposition  of  the  one, 
and  the  meanness  and  littleness  of  the  other,  it  is  not  nec- 
essary that  I  should  here  say  much.  But  I  will  give  a 
short  passage  from  our  author  as  to  each.  He  has  been 
quoting  somewhat  at  length  from  Sterne,  and  thus  he 
ends:  "And  Avith  this  pretty  dance  and  chorus  the  vol- 
ume artfully  concludes.  Even  here  one  can't  give  the 
whole  description.  There  is  not  a  page  in  Sterne's  writ- 
ino;  but  has  somcthinn;  that  were  better  awav,  a  latent  cor- 
ruption — a  hint  as  of  an  impure  presence.  Some  of  that 
dreary  double  entendre  may  be  attributed  to  freer  times 
and  manners  than  ours  —  but  not  all.  The  foul  satyr's 
eyes  leer  out  of  the  leaves  constantly.  The  last  words  the 
famous  author  wrote  were  bad  and  wricked.  The  last  lines 
the  poor  stricken  wretch  penned  were  for  pity  and  par- 
don." Now  a  line  or  two  about  Goldsmith,  and  I  will 
then  let  my  reader  go  to  the  volume  and  study  the  lect- 
ures for  himself.  "  The  poor  fellow  was  never  so  friend- 
less but  that  he  could  befriend  some  one ;  never  so  pinched 
and  wretched  but  he  could  give  of  his  crust,  and  speak  his 
word  of  compassion.  If  he  had  but  his  flute  left,  he  would 
give  that,  and  make  the  children  happy  in  the  dreary  Lon- 
don courts." 

Of  this,  too,  I  will  remind  my  readers — those  who  have 
bookshelves  w^ell-filled  to  adorn  their  houses — that  Gold- 
smith stands  in  the  front  where  all  the  young  people  see 


164  THACKERAY.  [chap.  th. 

the  volumes.  There  are  few  among  the  young  people  who 
do  not  refresh  their  sense  of  humour  occasionally  from 
that  shelf;  Sterne  is  relegated  to  some  distant  and  high 
corner.  The  less  often  that  he  is  taken  down  the  better. 
Thackeray  makes  some  half  excuse  for  him  because  of  the 
greater  freedom  of  the  times.  But  "the  times"  were  the 
Eame  for  the  two.  Both  Sterne  and  Goldsmith  wTote 
in  the  reign  of  George  II. ;  both  died  in  the  reign  of 
George  III. 


CHAPTER  VIII. 


Thackeray's  ballads* 


V/e  Lave  a  volume  of  Thackeray's  poems,  republished  un- 
der the  name  of  Ballads,  which  is,  I  think,  to  a  great  extent 
a  misnomer.  They  are  all  readable,  almost  all  good,  full  of 
humour,  and  with  some  fine  touches  of  pathos,  most  happy 
in  their  versification,  and,  with  a  few  exceptions,  hitting 
well  on  the  head  the  nail  which  he  intended  to  hit.  But 
they  are  not  on  that  account  ballads.  Literally,  a  ballad 
is  a  song;  but  it  has  come  to  signify  a  short  chronicle  in 
verse,  w^hich  may  be  political,  or  pathetic,  or  grotesque — 
or  it  may  have  all  three  characteristics  or  any  two  of  them ; 
but  not  on  that  account  is  any  grotesque  poem  a  ballad — 
nor,  of  course,  any  pathetic  or  any  political  poem.  Jacob 
Omnium'' s  Hoss  may  fairly  be  called  a  ballad,  containing 
as  it  does  a  chronicle  of  a  certain  well-defined  transaction ; 
and  the  story  of  King  Canute  is  a  ballad — one  of  the  best 
that  has  been  produced  in  our  language  in  modern  years. 
But  such  pieces  as  those  called  The  End  of  the  Play  and 
Vanitas  Vanitatum,  which  are  didactic  as  well  as  pathetic, 
are  not  ballads  in  the  common  sense ;  nor  are  such  songs 
as  The  Mahogany  Tree,  or  the  little  collection  called  Love 
Songs  made  Easy.  The  majority  of  the  pieces  are  not 
ballads;  but  if  they  be  good  of  the  kind,  we  should  be 
ungrateful  to  quarrel  much  with  the  name. 


166  THACKERAY.  [ciiap. 

How  very  good  most  of  them  are,  I  did  not  know  till 
I  re-read  them  for  the  purpose  of  writing  this  chapter. 
There  is  a  manifest  falling  off  in  some  few — which  has 
come  from  that  source  of  literary  failure  which  is  now  so 
common.  If  a  man  write  a  book  or  a  poem  because  it  is 
in  him  to  write  it — the  motive  power  being  altogether  in 
himself,  and  coming  from  his  desire  to  express  himself — 
he  will  write  it  well,  presuming  him  to  be  capable  of  the 
effort.  But  if  he  write  his  book  or  poem  simply  because 
a  book  or  poem  is  required  from  him,  let  his  capability 
be  what  it  may,  it  is  not  unlikely  that  he  will  do  it  badly. 
Thackeray  occasionally  suffered  from  the  weakness  thus 
produced.  A  ballad  from  Policeman  X — Bow  Street  Bal- 
lads they  were  first  called — was  required  by  Punch,  and 
had  to  be  forthcoming,  whatever  might  be  the  poet's  hu- 
mour, by  a  certain  time.  Jacob  Omnium'' s  Hoss  is  excel- 
lent. His  heart  and  feeling  were  all  there,  on  behalf  of 
his  friend,  and  against  that  obsolete  old  court  of  justice. 
But  we  can  tell  well  when  he  was  looking  through  the  po- 
lice reports  for  a  subject,  and  taking  what  chance  might 
send  him,  without  any  special  interest  in  the  matter.  The 
Knight  and  the  Lady  of  Bath,  and  the  Damages  Two 
Hundred  Pounds,  as  they  were  demanded  at  Guildford, 
taste  as  though  they  were  written  to  order. 

Here,  in  his  verses  as  in  his  prose,  the  charm  of  Thack- 
eray's work  lies  in  the  mingling  of  humour  with  pathos 
and  indignation.  There  is  hardly  a  piece  that  is  not  more 
or  less  funny,  hardly  a  piece  that  is  not  satirical ; — and  in 
most  of  them,  for  those  who  will  look  a  little  below  the 
surface,  there  is  something  that  will  touch  them.  Thack- 
eray, though  he  rarely  uttered  a  word,  either  with  his  pen 
or  his  mouth,  in  which  there  was  not  an  intention  to  reach 
our  sense  of  humour,  never  was  only  funny.     "When  ho 


ym.]  THACKERAY'S  BALLADS.  167 

was  most  determined  to  make  us  laugh,  he  had  always  a 
further  purpose;  some  pity  was  to  be  extracted  from  us 
on  behalf  of  the  sorrows  of  men,  or  some  indignation  at 
the  evil  done  by  them. 

This  is  the  beginning  of  that  story  as  to  the  Tivo  Hun- 
dred Pounds^  for  which,  as  a  ballad,  I  do  not  care  very 
much : 

Special  jurymen  of  England  who  admire  your  country's  laws, 
And  proclaim  a  British  jury  worthy  of  the  nation's  applause, 
Gaily  compliment  each  other  at  the  issue  of  a  cause, 
Which  was  tried  at  Guildford  'sizes,  this  day  week  as  ever  was. 

Here  he  is  indignant,  not  only  in  regard  to  some  miscar- 
riage of  justice  on  that  special  occasion,  but  at  the  gen- 
eral unfitness  of  jurymen  for  the  work  confided  to  them. 
"  Gaily  compliment  yourselves,"  he  says,  "  on  your  beauti- 
ful constitution,  from  which  come  such  beautiful  results 
as  those  I  am  going  to  tell  you !"  When  he  reminded 
us  that  Ivanhoe  had  produced  Magna  Charta,  there  was  a 
purpose  of  irony  even  there  in  regard  to  our  vaunted  free- 
dom. With  all  your  Magna  Charta  and  your  juries,  what 
are  you  but  snobs !  There  is  nothing  so  often  misguided 
as  general  indignation,  and  I  think  that  in  his  judgment 
of  outside  things,  in  the  measure  which  he  usually  took  of 
them,  Thackeray  was  very  frequently  misguided.  A  satir- 
ist by  trade  will  learn  to  satirise  everything,  till  the  light 
of  the  sun  and  the  moon's  loveliness  will  become  evil  and 
mean  to  him.  I  think  that  he  was  mistaken  in  his  views 
of  things.  But  we  have  to  do  with  him  as  a  writer,  not 
as  a  political  economist  or  a  politician.  His  indignation 
was  all  true,  and  the  expression  of  it  was  often  perfect. 
The  lines  in  which  he  addresses  that  Pallis  Court,  at  the 
end  of  Jacob  Omnium^s  JIoss,  are  almost  sublime. 


1G8  TUACKERAY.  [chap. 

0  Pallis  Court,  you  move  Come  down  from  that  tribewn, 
My  pity  most  profound.  Thou  shameless  and  unjust; 

A  most  amusing  sport  Thou  swindle,  picking  pockets  in 
You  thought  it,  I'll  be  bound,  The  name  of  Truth  august ; 

To    saddle    hup    a   three -pound  Come    down,  thou    hoary    Bias- 
debt,  phemy, 
With  two-and-twenty  pound.           For  die  thou  shalt  and  must. 

Good  sport  it  is  to  you  And  go  it,  Jacob  Homnium, 
To  grind  the  honest  poor.  And  ply  your  iron  pen, 

To  pay  their  just  or  unjust  debts  And  rise  up.  Sir  John  Jervis, 
With  eight  hundred  per  cent.,       And  shut  me  up  that  den ; 

for  Lor ;  That   sty  for  fattening   lawyers 

Make  haste  and  get  your  costes  in,  in. 

They  will  not  last  much  mor !         On  the  bones  of  honest  men. 

"  Come  down  from  tliat  tribewn,  thou  shameless  and 
unjust !"  It  is  impossible  not  to  feel  that  he  felt  this  as 
he  wrote  it. 

There  is  a  branch  of  his  poetry  which  he  calls  —  or 
which  at  any  rate  is  now  called,  Lyra  Hyhernica,  for  which 
no  doubt  The  Groves  of  Blarney  w\as  his  model.  There 
have  been  many  imitations  since,  of  which  perhaps  Bar- 
ham's  ballad  on  the  coronation  was  the  best,  "  When  to 
AVestminster  the  Royal  Spinster  and  the  Duke  of  Leinster 
all  in  order  did  repair!"  Thackeray,  in  some  of  his  at- 
tempts, has  been  equally  droll  and  equally  graphic.  That 
on  The  Cristal  Palace  —  not  that  at  Sydenham,  but  its 
forerunner,  the  palace  of  the  Great  Exhibition — is  very 
good,  as  the  following  catalogue  of  its  contents  will  show : 

There's  lioly  saints  There's  fountains  there 

And  window  paints.  And  crosses  fair ; 

By  Maydiayval  Pugin ;  There's  water-gods  with  urns ; 

Alhamborough  Jones  There's  organs  three, 

Did  paint  the  tones  To  play,  d'ye  see  ? 

Of  yellow  and  gambouge  in.  "  God  save  the  Queen,"  by  turns 


VIII.]  THACKERAY'S  BALLADS;  169 

There's  statues  bright  And  ploughs  h'ke  toys 

Of  marble  white,  For  little  boys, 

Of  silver,  and  of  copper ;  And  ilegant  wheel-barrow3. 

And  some  in  zinc. 

And  some,  I  think.  For  thim  genteels 

That  isn't  over  proper.  Who  ride  on  wheels. 

There's  plenty  to  indulge  'em ; 
There's  staym  ingynes,  There's  droskys  snug 

That  stands  in  lines,  From  Paytersbug, 

Enormous  and  amazing,  And  vayhycles  from  Bulgium. 

That  squeal  and  snort 

Like  whales  in  sport,  Tliere's  cabs  on  stands 

Or  elephants  a  grazing.  And  shaudthry  danns ; 

There's    waggons    from    New 
There's  carts  and  gigs,  York  here ; 

And  pins  for  pigs,  There's  Lapland  sleighs 

There's    dibblers    and   there's   Have  crossed  the  seas, 
harrows,  And  jaunting  cyars  from  Cork 

here. 

In  writing  tins  Thackeray  was  a  little  late  with  his  copy 
for  Punch ;  not,  we  should  say,  altogether  an  uncommon 
accident  to  him.  It  should  have  been  with  the  editor  ear- 
ly on  Saturday,  if  not  before,  but  did  not  come  till  late  on 
Saturday  evening.  The  editor,  who  was  among  men  the 
most  good-natured,  and  I  should  think  the  most  forbear- 
ing, either  could  not,  or  in  this  case  would  not,  insert  it  in 
the  next  week's  issue,  and  Thackeray,  angry  and  disgusted, 
sent  it  to  The  Times.  In  The  Times  of  next  Monday  it 
appeared — very  much,  I  should  think,  to  the  delight  of  the 
readers  of  that  august  newspaper. 

Mr.  Molony's  account  of  the  ball  given  to  the  Nepau- 
lese  ambassadors  by  the  Peninsular  and  Oriental  Com- 
pany, is  so  like  Barham's  coronation  in  the  account  it 
gives  of  the  guests,  that  one  would  fancy  it  must  be  by 
the  same  hand. 

8* 


170  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

The  noble  Chair^  stud  at  the  stair 

And  bade  the  dhrums  to  thump ;  and  he 

Did  thus  evince  to  that  Black  Prince 
The  welcome  of  his  Company.^ 

0  fair  the  girls  and  rich  the  curls, 

And  bright  the  oys  you  saw  there  was  ; 
And  fixed  each  oye  you  then  could  spoi 

On  General  Jung  Bahawther  was ! 

This  gineral  great  then  tuck  his  sate, 

With  all  the  other  ginerals, 
Bedad  his  troat,  his  belt,  his  coat, 

All  bleezed  with  precious  minerals ; 
And  as  he  there,  with  princely  air, 

Recloinin  on  his  cushion  was, 
All  round  about  his  royal  chair 

The  squeezin  and  the  pushin  was. 

0  Pat,  such  girls,  such  jukes  and  earls. 

Such  fashion  and  nobilitee  ! 
Just  think  of  Tim,  and  fancy  him 

Amidst  the  high  gentilitce ! 
There  was  the  Lord  de  L'Huys,  and  the  Portygeese 

Ministher  and  his  lady  there. 
And  I  recognised,  with  much  surprise, 

Our  messmate,  Bob  O'Grady,  there. 

All  these  are  very  good  fun — so  good  in  humour  and  so 
good  in  expression,  that  it  would  be  needless  to  criticise 
their  peculiar  dialect,  were  it  not  that  Thackeray  has  made 
for  himself  a  reputation  by  his  writing  of  Irish.  In  this 
he  has  been  so  entirely  successful  that  for  many  English 
readers  he  has  established  a  new  language  which  may  not 
improperly  be  called  Ilybernico-Thackerayan.  If  comedy 
is  to  be  got  from  peculiarities  of  dialect,  as  no  doubt  it  is, 

'  Chair— i.  <?.,  Chairman.         ^  /  ^^  The  P.  and  0.  Company. 


yiil]  THACKERAY'S  BALLADS.  171 

one  form  will  do  as  well  as  another,  so  long  as  those  who 
read  it  know  no  better.  So  it  has  been  with  Thackeray's 
Irish,  for  in  truth  he  was  not  familiar  with  the  modes  of 
pronunciation  which  make  up  Irish  brogue.  Therefore, 
though  he  is  always  droll,  he  is  not  true  to  nature.  Many 
an  Irishman  coming  to  London,  not  unnaturally  tries  to 
imitate  the  talk  of  Londoners.  You  or  I,  reader,  were  we 
from  the  West,  and  were  the  dear  County  Galway  to  send 
either  of  us  to  Parliament,  would  probably  endeavour  to 
drop  the  dear  brogue  of  our  country,  and  in  doing  so  we 
should  make  some  mistakes.  It  was  these  mistakes  which 
Thackeray  took  for  the  natural  Irish  tone.  He  was 
amused  to  hear  a  major  called  "  Meejor,"  but  was  una- 
ware that  the  sound  arose  from  Pat's  affection  of  English 
softness  of  speech.  The  expression  natural  to  the  unadul- 
terated Irishman  would  rather  be  "  Ma-ajor."  He  discov- 
ers his  own  provincialism,  and  trying  to  be  polite  and  ur- 
bane, he  says  "  Meejor."  In  one  of  the  lines  I  have  quoted 
there  occurs  the  word  "  troat."  Such  a  sound  never  came 
naturally  from  the  mouth  of  an  Irishman.  He  puts  in  an 
h  instead  of  omitting  it,  and  says  "  dhrink."  He  comes 
to  London,  and  finding  out  that  he  is  wrong  with  his 
"  dhrink,"  he  leaves  out  all  the  h's  he  can,  and  thus  comes 
to  "  troat."  It  is  this  which  Thackeray  has  heard.  There 
is  a  little  piece  called  the  Last  Irish  Grievance,  to  which 
Thackeray  adds  a  still  later  grievance,  by  the  false  sounds 
which  he  elicits  from  the  calumniated  mouth  of  the 
pretended  Irish  poet.  Slaves  are  "  sleeves,"  places  are 
"  pleeces,"  Lord  John  is  "  Lard  Jahn,"  fatal  is  "  fetal," 
danfjer  is  "  deenccer,"  and  native  is  "neetive."  All  these 
are  unintended  slanders.  Tea,  Hibernice,  is  "  tay,"  please 
is  "  plaise,"  sea  is  "  say,"  and  ease  is  "  aise."     The  softer 

sound  of  e  is  broadened  out  bv  the  natural  Irishman — not, 
M 


172  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

to  my  ear,  without  a  certain  eupbony ;  but  no  one  in  Ire- 
land says  or  hears  the  reverse.  The  Irishman  who  in  Lon- 
don might  talk  of  his  "  neetive  "  race,  would  be  mincing 
his  words  to  please  the  ear  of  the  cockney. 

The  Chronicle  of  the  Drum  would  be  a  true  ballad  all 
through,  were  it  not  that  there  is  tacked  on  to  it  a  long 
moral  in  an  altered  metre.  I  do  not  much  value  the  mor- 
al, but  the  ballad  is  excellent,  not  only  in  much  of  its  ver- 
sification and  in  the  turns  of  its  language,  but  in  the  quaint 
and  true  picture  it  gives  of  the  French  nation.  The  drum- 
mer, either  by  himself  or  by  some  of  his  family,  has  drum- 
med through  a  century  of  French  battling,  caring  much 
for  his  country  and  its  glory,  but  understanding  nothing 
of  the  causes  for  which  he  is  enthusiastic.  Whether  for 
King,  Republic,  or  Emperor,  whether  fighting  and  con- 
quering or  fighting  and  conquered,  he  is  happy  as  long  as 
he  can  beat  his  drum  on  a  field  of  glory.  But  throughout 
his  adventures  there  is  a  touch  of  chivalry  about  our  drum- 
mer. In  all  the  episodes  of  his  country's  career  he  feels 
much  of  patriotism  and  something  of  tenderness.  It  is 
thus  he  sings  during  the  days  of  the  Revolution : 

We  had  taken  the  head  of  King  Capet, 

We  called  for  the  blood  of  his  wife ; 
Undaunted  she  came  to  the  scaffold, 

And  bared  her  fair  neck  to  the  knife. 
As  she  felt  the  foul  fingers  that  touched  her, 

She  shrank,  but  she  deigned  not  to  speak ; 
She  looked  with  a  royal  disdain, 

And  died  with  a  blush  on  her  cheek ! 

'Twas  thus  that  our  country  was  saved ! 

So  told  us  the  Safety  Committee ! 
But,  psha,  I've  the  heart  of  a  soldier — 

All  gentleness,  mercy,  and  pity. 


VIII.]  THACKERAY'S  BALLADS  173 

I  loathed  to  assist  at  such  deeds, 

And  my  drum  beat  its  loudest  of  tunes, 

As  we  oifered  to  justice  offended, 
The  blood  of  the  bloody  tribunes. 

Away  with  such  foul  recollections  ! 

No  more  of  the  axe  and  the  block. 
I  saw  the  last  fight  of  the  sections, 

As  they  fell  'neath  our  guns  at  St.  Rock. 
Young  Bonaparte  led  us  that  day. 

And  so  it  goes  on.  I  will  not  continue  the  stanza,  be- 
cause it  contains  the  worst  rhyme  that  Thackeray  ever 
permitted  himself  to  use.  The  Chronicle  of  the  Drum  has 
not  the  finish  which  he  achieved  after v/ards,  but  it  is  full 
of  national  feeling,  and  carries  on  its  purpose  to  the  end 
with  an  admirable  persistency : 

A  curse  on  those  British  assassins 

Who  ordered  the  slaughter  of  Ney ; 
A  curse  on  Sir  Hudson  who  tortured 

The  life  of  our  hero  away. 
A  curse  on  all  Russians — I  hate  them ; 

On  all  Prussian  and  Austrian  fry  ; 
And,  oh,  but  I  pray  we  may  meet  them 

And  fight  them  again  ere  I  die. 

The  White  Squall — which  I  can  hardly  call  a  ballad, 
unless  any  description  of  a  scene  in  verse  may  be  included 
in  the  name — is  surely  one  of  the  most  graphic  descrip- 
tions ever  put  into  verse.  Nothing  written  by  Thackeray 
shows  more  plainly  his  power  over  w^ords  and  rhymes. 
He  draws  his  picture  without  a  line  omitted  or  a  line 
too  much,  saying  with  apparent  facility  all  that  he  has  to 
say,  and  so  saying  it  that  every  word  conveys  its  natural 

When  a  squall,  upon  a  sudden, 
Came  o'er  the  waters  scudding ; 


174  THACKEliAY.  [chap. 

And  the  clouds  began  to  gather, 
And  the  sea  was  lashed  to  lather, 
And  the  lowering  thunder  grumbled, 
And  the  lightning  jumped  and  tumbled, 
And  the  ship  and  all  the  ocean 
Woke  up  in  wild  commotion. 
Then  the  wind  set  up  a  howling, 
And  the  poodle-dog  a  yowling. 
And  the  cocks  began  a  crowing, 
And  the  old  cow  raised  a  lowing. 
As  she  heard  the  tempest  blowing ; 
And  fowls  and  geese  did  cackle, 
And  the  cordage  and  the  tackle 
Began  to  shriek  and  crackle ; 
And  the  spray  dashed  o'er  the  funnels, 
And  down  the  deck  in  runnels ; 
And  the  rushing  water  soaks  all. 
From  the  seamen  in  the  fo'ksal 
To  the  stokers  whose  black  faces 
Peer  out  of  their  bed-places ; 
And  the  captain,  he  was  bawling. 
And  the  sailors  pulling,  hauling. 
And  the  quarter-deck  tarpauling 
Was  shivered  in  the  squalUng ; 
And  the  passengers  awaken. 
Most  pitifully  shaken ; 
And  the  steward  jumps  up  and  hastens 
For  the  necessary  basins. 

Then  the  Greeks  they  groaned  and  quiveredo 

And  they  knelt,  and  moaned,  and  shivcrecS 

As  the  plunging  waters  met  them, 

And  splashed  and  overset  them ; 

And  they  call  in  their  emergence 

Upon  countless  saints  and  virgins ; 

And  their  marrowbones  are  bended, 

And  they  think  the  world  is  ended. 

And  the  Turkish  women  for'ard 

W^r«>  frightened  and  behorror'd ; 


viii.]  THACKERAY'S  BALLADS.  ITS 

And  shrieking  and  bewildering, 
The  mothers  clutched  their  children  ; 
The  men  sang  "Allah  !  Illah ! 
Mashallah  Bis-millah !" 
As  the  warning  waters  doused  them, 
And  splashed  them  and  soused  them ; 
And  they  called  upon  the  Prophet, 
And  thought  but  little  of  it. 

Then  all  the  fleas  in  Jewry  , 

Jumped  up  and  bit  like  fury ; 

And  the  progeny  of  Jacob 

Did  on  the  main-deck  wake  up. 

(I  wot  these  greasy  Rabbins 

"Would  never  pay  for  cabins) ; 

And  each  man  moaned  and  jabbered  in 

His  filthy  Jewish  gaberdine, 

In  woe  and  lamentation, 

And  howling  consternation. 

And  the  splashing  water  drenches 

Their  dirty  brats  and  wenches ; 

And  they  crawl  from  bales  and  benches. 

In  a  hundred  thousand  stenches. 

This  was  the  White  Squall  famous. 

Which  latterly  o'ercame  us. 

Peg  of  Limavaddy  has  always  been  very  popular,  and 
ttie  public  have  not,  I  think,  been  generally  aware  that  the 
young  lady  in  question  lived  in  truth  at  Newton  Limavady 
(with  one  d).  But  with  the  correct  name  Thackeray  would 
hardly  have  been  so  successful  with  hin  rhymes. 

Citizen  or  Squire 

Tory,  Whig,  or  Radi- 
cal would  all  desire 

Peg  of  Limavaddy. 
Had  I  Homer's  fire 

Or  that  of  Sergeant  Taddy 


176  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

Meetly  I'd  admire 

Peg  of  Liraavaddy. 
And  till  I  expire 

Or  till  I  go  mad  I 
"Will  sing  unto  my  lyre 

Peg  of  Limavaddy. 

The  Cane- bottomed  Chair  is  another,  better,  I  thint, 
than  Peg  of  Limavaddy,  as  containing  that  mixture  of 
burlesque  with  the  pathetic  which  belonged  so  peculiarly 
to  Thackeray,  and  which  was  indeed  the  very  essence  of 
his  genius. 

But  of  all  the  cheap  treasures  that  garnish  my  nest, 
There's  one  that  I  love  and  I  cherish  the  best. 

For  the  finest  of  couches  that's  padded  with  hair 
I  never  would  change  thee,  my  cane-bottomed  chair. 

'Tis  a  bandy-legged,  high-bottomed,  worm-eaten  seat, 

With  a  creaking  old  back  and  twisted  old  feet ; 
But  since  the  fair  morning  when  Fanny  sat  there, 

I  bless  thee  and  love  thee,  old  cane-bottomed  chair. 
***** 
She  comes  from  the  past  and  revisits  my  room, 

She  looks  as  she  then  did,  all  beauty  and  bloom ; 
So  smiling  and  tender,  so  fresh  and  so  fair. 

And  yonder  she  sits  in  my  cane-bottomed  chair. 

This,  in  the  volume  which  I  have  now  before  me,  is  fol- 
lowed by  a  picture  of  Fanny  in  the  chair,  to  which  I  can- 
not but  take  exception.  I  am  quite  sure  that  when  Fanny 
graced  the  room  and  seated  herself  in  the  chair  of  her  old 
bachelor  friend,  she  had  not  on  a  low  dress  and  loosely- 
flowing  drawing-room  shawl,  nor  was  there  a  footstool 
ready  for  her  feet.  I  doubt  also  the  headgear.  Fanny 
on  that  occasion  was  dressed  in  her  morning  apparel,  and 
had  walked  through  the  streets,  carried  no  fan,  and  wore 


VIII.]  THACKERAY'S  BALLADS.  177 

no  brooch  but  one  that  might  be  necessary  for  pinning  her 
shawl. 

The  Great  Cossack  Epic  is  the  longest  of  the  ballads. 
It  is  a  legend  of  St.  Sophia  of  Kioff,  telling  how  Father 
Hyacinth,  by  the  aid  of  St.  Sophia,  whose  w^ooden  statue 
he  carried  with  him,  escaped  across  the  Borysthenes  with 
all  the  Cossacks  at  his  tail.  It  is  very  good  fun,  but  not 
equal  to  many  of  the  others.  Nor  is  the  Carmen  Lilliense 
quite  to  my  taste.  I  should  not  have  declared  at  once  that 
it  had  come  from  Thackeray's  hand,  had  I  not  known  it. 

But  who  could  doubt  the  Bouillabaisse  ?  Who  else 
could  have  wTitten  that  ?  Who  at  the  same  moment  could 
have  been  so  merry  and  so  melancholy — could  have  gone 
so  deep  into  the  regrets  of  life,  with  words  so  appropriate 
to  its  jollities?  I  do  not  know  how  far  my  readers  will 
agree  with  me  that  to  read  it  always  must  be  a  fresh  pleas- 
ure ;  but  in  order  that  they  may  agree  with  me,  if  they  can, 
I  will  give  it  to  them  entire.  If  there  be  one  whom  it  does 
not  please,  he  will  like  nothing  that  Thackeray  ever  wrote 
in  verse. 

THE   BALLAD   OF  BOUILLABAISSE. 

A  street  there  is  in  Paris  famous, 

For  which  no  rhyme  our  language  yields, 
Rue  Xeuve  des  Petits  Champs  its  name  is — 

The  New  Street  of  the  Little  Fields ; 
And  here's  an  inn,  not  rich  and  splendid, 

But  still  in  comfortable  case ; 
The  which  in  youth  I  oft  attended, 

To  eat  a  bowl  of  Bouillabaisse. 

This  Bouillabaisse  a  noble  dish  is — 

A  sort  of  soup,  or  broth,  or  brew. 
Or  hotch-potch  of  all  sorts  of  fishes, 

That  Greenwich  never  could  outdo ; 


178  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

Green  herbs,  red  peppers,  mussels,  saffron, 

Soles,  onions,  garlic,  roach,  and  dace : 
All  these  you  eat  at  Terre's  tavern, 

In  that  one  dish  of  Bouillabaisse. 

Indeed,  a  rich  and  savoury  stew  'tis ; 

And  true  philosophers,  methinks. 
Who  love  all  sorts  of  natural  beauties, 

Should  love  good  victuals  and  good  drinks. 
And  Cordeher  or  Benedictine 

Might  gladly  sure  his  lot  embrace, 
Nor  find  a  fast-day  too  afflicting* 

Which  served  him  up  a  Bouillabaisse, 

I  wonder  if  the  house  still  there  is  ? 

Yes,  hC'Te  the  lamp  is,  as  before ; 
The  smiling  red-checked  ecaillere  is 

Still  opening  oysters  at  the  door. 
Is  Terre  still  alive  and  able  ? 

I  recollect  his  droll  grimace  ; 
Ile'd  come  and  smile  before  your  table, 

And  hope  you  liked  your  Bouillabaisse. 

We  enter — nothing's  changed  or  older. 

"  How's  Monsieur  Terre,  waiter,  pray  ?" 
The  waiter  stares  and  shrugs  his  shoulder — 

"  Monsieur  is  dead  this  many  a  day." 
"  It  is  the  lot  of  saint  and  sinner ; 

So  honest  Terre's  run  his  race." 
"  What  will  Monsieur  require  for  dinner  ?'' 

"  Say,  do  you  still  cook  Bouillabaisse  ?" 

"Oh,oui,  Monsieur,"  's  the  waiter's  answer, 

"  Quel  vin  Monsieur  desire-t-il  ?" 
"  Tell  me  a  good  one."     "  That  I  can,  sir : 

The  chambcrtin  with  yellow  seal." 
"  So  Terre's  gone,"  I  say,  and  sink  in 

My  old  accustom'd  corner-place ; 
"  He's  done  with  feasting  and  with  drinking, 

With  Burgundy  and  Bouillabaisse." 


TUi.]  THACKERAY'S  BALLADS.  lid 

My  old  accustomed  corner  here  is, 

The  table  still  is  in  the  nook ; 
Ah !  vanish'd  many  a  busy  year  is 

This  well-known  chair  since  last  I  took. 
"When  first  I  saw  ye,  cari  luoghi, 

I'd  scarce  a  beard  upon  my  face, 
And  now  a  grizzled,  grim  old  fogy, 

I  sit  and  wait  for  Bouillabaisse. 

Where  are  you,  old  companions  trusty, 

Of  early  days  here  met  to  dine  ? 
Come,  waiter !  quick,  a  flagon  crusty ; 

I'll  pledge  them  in  the  good  old  wine. 
The  kind  old  voices  and  old  faces 

My  memory  can  quick  retrace ; 
Around  the  board  they  take  their  places, 

And  share  the  wine  and  Bouillabaisse. 

There's  Jack  has  made  a  wondrous  marriage ; 

There's  laughing  Tom  is  laughing  yet ; 
There's  brave  Augustus  drives  his  carriage ; 

There's  poor  old  Fred  in  the  Gazette; 
O'er  James's  head  the  grass  is  growing. 

Good  Lord  !  the  world  has  wagged  apace 
Since  here  we  set  the  claret  flowing, 

And  drank,  and  ate  the  Bouillabaisse. 

Ah  me  !  how  quick  the  days  are  flitting ! 

I  mind  me  of  a  time  that's  gone, 
When  here  I'd  sit,  as  now  I'm  sitting, 

In  this  same  place — but  not  alone. 
A  fair  young  face  was  nestled  near  me, 

A  dear,  dear  face  looked  fondly  up, 
And  sweetly  spoke  and  smiled  to  cheer  me? 

There's  no  one  now  to  share  my  cup. 
***** 
I  drink  it  as  the  Fates  ordain  it. 

Come  fill  it,  and  have  done  with  rhymes; 
Fill  up  the  lonely  glass,  and  drain  it 

In  racmorv  of  dear  old  times. 


180  THACKERAY.  [chap.  nn. 

"Welcome  the  wine,  whate'er  the  seal  is ; 

And  sit  you  down  and  say  your  grace 
With  thankful  heart,  whate'er  the  meal  is. 

Here  comes  the  smoking  Bouillabaisse. 

I  am  not  disposed  to  say  that  Thackeray  will  hold  a 
high  place  among  English  poets.  lie  would  have  been 
the  first  to  ridicule  such  an  assumption  made  on  his  be- 
half. But  I  think  that  his  verses  will  be  more  popular 
than  those  of  many  highly  reputed  poets,  and  that  as 
years  roll  on  they  will  gain  rather  than  lose  in  public 
estimation. 


CHAPTER  IX. 

Thackeray's  style  and  manner  of  work. 

A  NOVEL  in  style  slioiild  be  easy,  lucid,  and  of  course 
grammatical.  The  same  may  be  said  of  any  book;  but 
that  which  is  intended  to  recreate  should  be  easily  under- 
stood— for  "which  purpose  lucid  narration  is  an  essential. 
In  matter  it  should  be  moral  and  amusing.  In  manner  it 
may  be  realistic,  or  sublime,  or  ludicrous;  or  it  may  be 
all  these  if  the  author  can  combine  them.  As  to  Thack- 
eray's performance  in  style  and  matter  I  will  say  some- 
thing further  on.  His  manner  was  mainly  realistic,  and 
I  will  therefore  speak  first  of  that  mode  of  expression 
which  was  peculiarly  his  own. 

Realism  in  style  has  not  all  the  ease  which  seems  to  be- 
long to  it.  It  is  the  object  of  the  author  who  afiects  it 
so  to  communicate  with  his  reader  that  all  his  words  shall 
seem  to  be  natural  to  the  occasion.  We  do  not  think 
the  language  of  Dogberry  natural,  when  he  tells  neigh- 
bour Seacole  that  "  to  write  and  read  comes  by  nature." 
That  is  ludicrous.  Nor  is  the  lano;uao;e  of  Hamlet  nat- 
ural  when  he  shows  to  his  mother  the  portrait  of  his 
father : 

See  what  a  grace  was  seated  on  this  brow ; 
Hyperion's  curls  ;  the  front  of  Jove  himself ; 
An  eye  like  Mars,  to  threaten  and  command. 


182  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

That  is  sublime.  Constance  is  natural  wlien  she  turns 
away  from  the  Cardinal,  declaring  that 

He  talks  to  me  that  nevef  had  a  son. 

In  one  respect  both  the  sublime  and  ludicrous  are  easier 
than  the  realistic.  They  are  not  required  to  be  true.  A 
man  with  an  imagination  and  culture  may  feign  either  of 
them  without  knowing  the  ways  of  men.  To  be  realistic 
you  must  know  accurately  that  which  you  describe.  How 
often  do  we  find  in  novels  that  the  author  makes  an  at- 
tempt at  realism  and  falls  into  a  bathos  of  absurdity,  be- 
cause he  cannot  use  appropriate  language?  "No  human 
being  ever  spoke  like  that,"  w^e  say  to  ourselves — while  we 
should  not  question  the  naturalness  of  the  production,  ei- 
ther in  the  grand  or  the  ridiculous. 

And  yet  in  very  truth  the  realistic  must  not  be  true — 
but  just  so  far  removed  from  truth  as  to  suit  the  erroneous 
idea  of  truth  which  the  reader  may  be  supposed  to  enter- 
tain. For  were  a  novelist  to  narrate  a  conversation  between 
two  persons  of  fair  but  not  high  education,  and  to  use  the 
ill-arranged  words  and  fragments  of  speech  which  are  real- 
ly common  in  such  conversations,  he  would  seem  to  have 
sunk  to  the  ludicrous,  and  to  be  attributing  to  the  interloc- 
utors a  mode  of  lanQjuai^e  much  beneath  them.  Thouc-h 
in  fact  true,  it  would  seem  to  be  far  from  natural.  But, 
on  the  other  hand,  were  he  to  put  words  grammatically 
correct  into  the  mouths  of  his  personages,  and  to  round  off 
and  to  complete  the  spoken  sentences,  the  ordinary  reader 
would  instantly  feel  such  a  style  to  be  stilted  and  unreal. 
This  reader  would  not  analyse  it,  but  w^ould  in  some  dim 
but  sufficiently  critical  manner  be  aware  that  his  author 
was  not  providing  him  with  a  naturally  spoken  dialogue. 
To  produce  the  desired  effect  the  narrator  must  go  be 


IX.]     THACKERAY'S  STYLE  AND  MANNER  OF  WORK.     183 

tween  tlic  two.  He  must  mount  somewhat  above  the  or- 
dinary conversational  powers  of  such  persons  as  are  to  be 
represented — lest  he  disgust.  But  he  must  by  no  means 
soar  into  correct  phraseology — lest  he  offend.  The  real- 
istic— by  w^liich  we  mean  that  which  shall  seem  to  be  real 
— lies  between  the  two,  and  in  reaching  it  the  writer  has 
not  only  to  keep  his  proper  distance  on  both  sides,  but  has 
to  maintain  varying  distances  in  accordance  with  the  posi- 
tion, mode  of  life,  and  education  of  the  speakers.  Lady 
Castlcwood  in  Esmond  would  not  have  been  properly  made 
to  speak  with  absolute  precision ;  but  she  goes  nearer  to 
the  mark  than  her  more  ignorant  lord,  the  viscount ;  less 
near,  however,  than  her  better- educated  kinsman,  Henry 
Esmond.  He,  however,  is  not  made  to  speak  altogether 
by  the  card,  or  he  would  be  unnatural.  Nor  would  each 
of  them  speak  always  in  the  same  strain,  but  they  would 
alter  their  language  according  to  their  companion — accord- 
ing even  to  the  hour  of  the  day.  All  this  the  reader  un- 
consciousl}^  perceives,  and  will  not  think  the  language  to 
be  natural  unless  the  proper  variations  be  there. 

In  simple  narrative  the  rule  is  the  same  as  in  dialogue, 
though  it  does  not  admit  of  the  sam.e  palpable  deviation 
from  correct  construction.  The  story  of  any  incident,  to 
be  realistic,  will  admit  neither  of  sesquipedalian  grandeur 
nor  of  grotesque  images.  The  one  gives  an  idea  of  ro- 
mance and  the  other  of  burlesque,  to  neither  of  which  is 
truth  supposed  to  appertain.  We  desire  to  soar  frequent- 
ly, and  then  we  try  romance.  We  desire  to  recreate  our- 
selves with  the  easy  and  droll.  Dulce  est  desipere  in  loco. 
Then  we  have  recourse  to  burlesque.  But  in  neither  do 
we  expect  human  nature. 

I  cannot  but  think  that  in  the  hands  of  the  novelist  the 
middle  course  is  the  most  powerful.     Much  as  we  may 


184  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

delight  in  burlesque,  we  cannot  claim  for  it  the  power  of 
achieving  great  results.  So  much,  I  think,  will  be  granted. 
For  the  sublime  we  look  rather  to  poetry  than  to  prose; 
and  though  I  will  give  one  or  two  instances  just  now  in 
which  it  has  been  used  with  great  effect  in  prose  fiction, 
it  does  not  come  home  to  the  heart,  teaching  a  lesson,  as 
does  the  realistic.  The  girl  who  reads  is  touched  by  Lucy 
Ashton,  but  she  feels  herself  to  be  convinced  of  the  facts 
as  to  Jcanie  Deans,  and  asks  herself  whether  she  might 
not  emulate  them. 

Now  as  to  the  realism  of  Thackeray,  I  must  rather  ap- 
peal to  my  readers  than  attempt  to  prove  it  by  quotation. 
"Whoever  it  is  that  speaks  in  his  pages,  does  it  not  seem 
that  such  a  person  would  certainly  have  used  such  words 
on  such  an  occasion  ?  If  there  be  need  of  examination  to 
learn  whether  it  be  so  or  not,  let  the  reader  study  all  that 
falls  from  the  mouth  of  Lady  Castlewood  through  the 
novel  called  Esmond^  or  all  that  falls  from  the  mouth  of 
Beatrix.  They  are  persons  peculiarly  situated  —  noble 
women,  but  who  have  still  lived  much  out  of  the  world. 
The  former  is  always  conscious  of  a  sorrow ;  the  latter  is 
always  striving  after  an  effect — and  both  on  this  account 
are  difficult  of  management.  A  period  for  the  story  has 
been  chosen  which  is  strange  and  unknown  to  us,  and 
which  has  required  a  peculiar  language.  One  would  have 
said  beforehand  that  whatever  might  be  the  charms  of  the 
book,  it  would  not  be  natural.  And  yet  the  ear  is  never 
wounded  by  a  tone  that  is  false.  It  is  not  always  the  case 
that  in  novel  reading  the  ear  should  be  wounded  because 
the  words  spoken  are  unnatural.  Bulwer  does  not  wound, 
though  he  never  puts  into  the  mouth  of  any  of  his  per- 
sons words  such  as  would  have  been  spoken.  They  are  not 
expected  from  him.     It  is  something  else  that  he  provides. 


ts.]     THACKERAY'S  STYLE  AND  MANNER  OF  WORK.     ]85 

From  Thackeray  they  are  expected — and  from  many  oth- 
ers. But  Thackeray  never  disappoints.  Whether  it  be  a 
great  duke,  such  as  he  who  was  to  have  married  Beatrix, 
or  a  mean  chaplain,  such  as  Tusher,  or  Captain  Steele  the 
humorist,  they  talk — not  as  they  would  have  talked  prob- 
ably, of  which  I  am  no  judge — but  as  we  feel  that  they 
might  have  talked.  We  find  ourselves  willing  to  take  it 
as  proved  because  it  is  there,  which  is  the  strongest  possi- 
ble evidence  of  the  realistic  capacity  of  the  writer. 

As  to  the  sublime  in  novels,  it  is  not  to  be  supposed 
that  any  very  high  rank  of  sublimity  is  required  to  put 
such  works  within  the  pale  of  that  definition.  I  allude  to 
those  in  which  an  attempt  is  made  to  soar  above  the  ordi- 
nary actions  and  ordinary  language  of  life.  We  may  take 
as  an  instance  The  Mysteries  of  JJdolpho.  That  is  intend- 
ed to  be  sublime  throughout.  Even  the  writer  never  for 
a  moment  thought  of  descending  to  real  life.  She  must 
have  been  untrue  to  her  own  idea  of  her  own  business  had 
she  done  so.  It  is  all  stilted  —  all  of  a  certain  altitude 
among  the  clouds.  It  has  been  in  its  time  a  popular  book, 
and  has  had  its  world  of  readers.  Those  readers  no  doubt 
preferred  the  diluted  romance  of  Mrs.  Radclifi  to  the  con- 
densed realism  of  Fielding.  At  any  rate,  they  did  not  look 
for  realism.  Pelham  may  be  taken  as  another  instance  of 
the  sublime,  though  there  is  so  much  in  it  that  is  of  the 
world  worldly,  though  an  intentional  fall  to  the  ludicrous 
is  often  made  in  it.  The  personages  talk  in  glittering  di- 
alogues, throwing  about  philosophy,  science,  and  the  clas- 
sics, in  a  manner  which  is  always  suggestive  and  often 
amusing.  The  book  is  brilliant  with  intellect.  But  no 
word  is  ever  spoken  as  it  would  have  been  spoken — no  de- 
tail is  ever  narrated  as  it  would  have  occurred.  Bulwer  no 
doubt  regarded  novels  as  romantic,  and  would  have  lookec^ 

9 


186  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

-with  contempt  on  any  junction  of  realism  and  romance, 
though,  in  varying  his  work,  he  did  not  think  it  beneath 
him  to  vary  his  subUmity  with  the  ludicrous.  ^  The  sub- 
lime in  novels  is  no  doubt  most  effective  when  it  breaks 
out,  as  though  by  some  burst  of  nature,  in  the  midst  of 
a  story  true  to  life.  "  If,"  said  Evan  Maccorabich,  "  the 
Saxon  gentlemen  are  laughing  because  a  poor  man  such  as 
me  thinks  my  life,  or  the  life  of  six  of  my  degree,  is  worth 
that  of  Vich  Ian  Vohr,  it's  like  enough  they  may  be  very 
right;  but  if  they  laugh  because  they  think  I  would  not 
keep  my  word  and  come  back  to  redeem  him,  I  can  tell 
them  they  ken  neither  the  heart  of  a  Hielandraan  nor  the 
honour  of  a  gentleman."  That  is  sublime.  And,  again, 
when  Balfour  of  Burley  slaughters  Bothwell,  the  death 
scene  is  sublime.  "Die,  bloodthirsty  dog!"  said  Burley. 
"  Die  as  thou  hast  lived !  Die  like  the  beasts  that  per- 
ish— hoping  nothing,  believing  nothing !" — "  And  fearing 
nothing,"  said  Bothwell.  Ilorrible  as  is  the  picture,  it  is 
sublime.  As  is  also  that  speech  of  Meg  Merrilics,  as  she 
addresses  Mr.  Bertram,  standing  on  the  bank.  "  Ride  your 
ways,"  said  the  gipsy ;  "  ride  your  ways,  Laird  of  Ellan- 
gowan  ;  ride  your  ways,  Godfrey  Bertram.  This  day  have 
ye  quenched  seven  smoking  hearths ;  see  if  the  fire  in  your 
ain  parlour  burn  the  blyther  for  that.  Ye  have  riven  the 
thack  off  seven  cottar  houses;  look  if  your  ain  roof-tree 
stand  the  faster.  Ye  may  stable  your  stirks  in  the  shcal- 
ings  at  Derncleugh ;  see  that  the  hare  does  not  couch  on 
the  hearthstane  at  Ellangowan."  That  is  romance,  and 
reaches  the  very  height  of  the  sublime.  That  does  not 
offend,  impossible  though  it  be  that  any  old  woman  should 
have  spoken  such  words,  because  it  docs  in  truth  lift  the 
reader  up  among  llie  bright  stars.  It  is  thus  that  the  sub- 
lime may  be  mingled  with  the  realistic,  if  the  writer  has 


IX.]     THACKERAY'S  STYLE  AND  MANNER  OF  WORK.     187 

the  powerj  Thackeray  also  rises  in  that  way  to  a  high 
pitch,  though  not  in  many  instances.  Romance  does  not 
often  justify  to  him  an  absence  of  truth.  The  scene  be^ 
twccn  Lady  Castle  wood  and  the  Duke  of  Hamilton  is  one 
when  she  explains  to  her  child's  suitor  who  Henry  Esmond 
is.  "  My  daughter  may  receive  presents  from  the  head  of 
our  house,"  says  the  lady,  speaking  up  for  her  kinsman. 
"  My  daughter  may  thankfully  take  kindness  from  her  fa- 
ther's, her  mother's,  her  brother's  dearest  friend."  The 
whole  scene  is  of  the  same  nature,  and  is  evidence  of 
Thackeray's  capacity  for  the  sublime.  And  again,  when 
the  same  lady  welcomes  the  same  kinsman  on  his  return 
from  the  wars,  she  rises  as  high.  But  as  I  have  already 
quoted  a  part  of  the  passage  in  the  chapter  on  this  novel, 
I  will  not  repeat  it  here. 

It  may  perhaps  be  said  of  the  sublime  in  novels — which 
I  have  endeavoured  to  describe  as  not  being  generally  of 
a  high  order — that  it  is  apt  to  become  cold,  stilted,  and 
unsatisfactory.  What  may  be  done  by  impossible  castles 
among  impossible  mountains,  peopled  by  impossible  heroes 
and  heroines,  and  fraught  with  impossible  horrors.  The 
Mysteries  of  JJdolpho  have  shown  us.  But  they  require 
a  patient  reader,  and  one  who  can  content  himself  with  a 
long  protracted  and  most  unemotional  excitement.  The 
sublimity  which  is  effected  by  sparkling  speeches  is  better, 
if  the  speeches  really  have  something  in  them  beneath  the 
sparkles.  Those  of  Bulwer  generally  have.  Those  of  his 
imitators  are  often  without  anything,  the  sparkles  even 
hardly  sparkling.  At  the  best  they  fatigue ;  and  a  novel, 
if  it  fatigues,  is  unpardonable.  Its  only  excuse  is  to  be 
found  in  the  amusement  it  affords.  It  should  instruct 
also,  no  doubt,  but  it  never  will  do  so  unless  it  hides  its 

instruction  and  amuses.     Scott  understood  all  this,  when 

N 


188  THACKERAY.  [cuap. 

he  allowed  himself  only  such  sudden  bursts  as  I  have  de- 
scribed. Even  in  The  Bride  of  Lammermoor,  which  I  do 
not  regard  as  among  the  best  of  his  performances,  as  he 
soars  high  into  the  sublime,  so  does  he  descend  low  into 
the  ludicrous. 

In  this  latter  division  of  pure  fiction — the  burlesque,  as 
it  is  commonly  called,  or  the  ludicrous  —  Thackeray  is 
quite  as  much  at  home  as  in  the  realistic,  though,  the  ve- 
hicle being  less  powerful,  he  has  achieved  smaller  results 
by  it.  Manifest  as  are  the  objects  in  his  view  when  he 
wrote  The  Hoggarty  Diamond  or  The  Legend  of  the  Mhine, 
they  were  less  important  and  less  evidently  effected  than 
those  attempted  by  Vanity  Fair  and  Pendennis.  Cap- 
tain Shindy,  the  Snob,  does  not  tell  us  so  plainly  what  is 
not  a  gentleman  as  does  Colonel  Newcome  what  is.  Nev- 
ertheless, the  ludicrous  has,  with  Thackeray,  been  very 
powerful  and  very  delightful. 

In  trying  to  describe  what  is  done  by  literature  of  this 
class,  it  is  especially  necessary  to  remember  that  different 
readers  are  affected  in  a  different  way.  That  which  is 
one  man's  meat  is  another  man's  poison.  In  the  sublime, 
when  the  really  grand  has  been  reached,  it  is  the  reader's 
own  fault  if  he  be  not  touched.  We  know  that  many 
are  indifferent  to  the  soliloquies  of  Hamlet,  but  we  do  not 
hesitate  to  declare  to  ourselves  that  they  are  so  because 
they  lack  the  power  of  appreciating  grand  language.  Wc 
do  not  scruple  to  attribute  to  those  who  are  indifferent 
some  inferiority  of  intelligence.  And  in  regard  to  the 
realistic,  when  the  truth  of  a  well-told  story  or  life-like 
character  does  not  come  home,  we  think  that  then,  too, 
there  is  deficiency  in  the  critical  ability.  But  there  is 
nothing  necessarily  lacking  to  a  man  because  lie  does  not 
enjoy   The  Heathen   Chinee  or  The  Biglow  Papers;  -ind 


IX.]     THACKERAY'S  STYLE  AND  MANNER  OF  WORK.     189 

the  man  to  whom  these  delights  of  American  humour  are 
leather  and  prunello  may  be  of  all  the  most  enraptured  by 
the  wit  of  Sam  Weller  or  the  mock  piety  of  Pecksniff. 
It  is  a  matter  of  taste  and  not  of  intellect,  as  one  man 
likes  caviare  after  his  dinner,  while  another  prefers  apple- 
pie  ;  and  the  man  himself  cannot,  or,  as  far  as  we  can  see, 
does  not,  direct  his  own  taste  in  the  one  matter  more  than 
in  the  other. 

Therefore  I  cannot  ask  others  to  share  with  me  the  de- 
light which  I  have  in  the  various  and  peculiar  expressions 
of  the  ludicrous  which  are  common  to  Thackeray.  Some 
considerable  portion  of  it  consists  in  bad  spelling.  We 
may  say  that  Charles  James  Harrington  Fitzroy  Yellow- 
plnsh,  or  C.  FitzJeames  De  La  Pluche,  as  he  is  afterwards 
called,  would  be  nothing  but  for  his  "  orthogwaphy  so 
carefully  inaccuwate."  As  I  have  before  said,  Mrs.  Mai- 
aprop  had  seemed  to  have  reached  the  height  of  this  hu- 
mour, and  in  having  done  so  to  have  made  any  repetition 
unpalatable.  But  Thackeray's  studied  blundering  is  alto- 
gether different  from  that  of  Sheridan.  Mrs.  Malaprop 
uses  her  words  in  a  delightfully  wrong  sense.  Yellow- 
plush  would  be  a  very  intelligible,  if  not  quite  an  accurate 
writer,  had  he  not  made  for  himself  special  forms  of  Eng- 
lish words  altogether  new  to  the  eye. 

"  My  ma  wrapped  up  my  buth  in  a  mistry.  I  may  be 
illygitmit;  I  may  have  been  changed  at  nus  ;  but  I've  al- 
ways had  gen'l'm'nly  tastes  through  life,  and  have  no 
doubt  that  I  come  of  a  gen'l'm'nly  origum."  We  cannot 
admit  that  there  is  wit,  or  even  humour,  in  bad  spelling 
alone.  Were  it  not  that  Yellowplush,  with  his  bad  spell- 
ing, had  so  much  to  say  for  himself,  there  would  be  noth- 
ing in  it ;  but  there  is  always  a  sting  of  satire  directed 
against  some  real  vice,  or  some  growing  vulgarity,  which  is 


i90  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

made  sharper  by  the  absurdity  of  the  language.  In  The, 
Diary  of  George  IV.  there  are  the  following  reflections 
on  a  certain  correspondence  :  "  Wooden  you  phansy,  now, 
that  the  author  of  such  a  letter,  instead  of  writun  about 
pipple  of  tip -top  quality,  was  describin'  Vinegar  Yard? 
Would  you  beleave  that  the  lady  he  was  a-ritin'  to  was 
a  chased  modist  lady  of  honour  and  mother  of  a  family? 
0  trumpery !  o  morris!  as  Homer  says.  This  is  a  hige- 
ous  pictur  of  manners,  such  as  I  weap  to  think  of,  as  ev- 
ery morl  man  must  weap."  We  do  not  wonder  that  when 
he  makes  his  "  ajew  "  he  should  have  been  called  up  to  be 
congratulated  on  the  score  of  his  literary  performances  by 
his  master,  before  the  Duke,  and  Lord  Bagwig,  and  Dr. 
Larner,  aiid  "  Sawedwadgeorgeearllittnbulwig."  All  that 
Yellowplush  says  or  writes  are  among  the  pearls  which 
Thackeray  was  continually  scattering  abroad. 

But  this  of  the  distinguished  footman  was  only  one  of 
the  forms  of  the  ludicrous  which  he  was  accustomed  to 
use  in  the  furtherance  of  some  purpose  which  he  had  at 
heart.  It  was  his  practice  to  clothe  things  most  revolt- 
ing with  an  assumed  grace  and  dignity,  and  to  add  to  the 
weight  of  his  condemnation  by  the  astounding  mendacity 
of  the  parody  thus  drawn.  There  was  a  grim  humour  in 
this  which  has  been  displeasing  to  some,  as  seeming  to 
hold  out  to  vice  a  hand  which  has  appeared  for  too  long  a 
time  to  be  friendly.  As  we  are  disposed  to  be  not  alto- 
gether sympathetic  with  a  detective  policeman  who  shall 
have  spent  a  jolly  night  with  a  delinquent,  for  the  sake  of 
tracing  home  the  suspected  guilt  to  his  late  comrade,  so 
are  some  disposed  to  be  almost  angry  with  our  author, 
who  seems  to  be  too  much  at  home  with  his  rascals,  and 
to  live  with  them  on  familiar  terms  till  we  doubt  whether 
he  docs  not  forget  their  rascality.     Barry  Lyndon  is  the 


IX.]     THACKERAY'S  STYLE  AND  MANNER  OF  WORK.     191 

strongest  example  we  Lave  of  this  style  of  the  ludicrous, 
and  the  critics  of  whom  I  speak  have  thought  that  our 
friendly  relations  with  Barry  have  been  too  genial,  too 
apparently  genuine,  so  that  it  might  almost  be  doubtful 
whether  during  the  narrative  we  might  not,  at  this  or  the 
other  crisis,  be  rather  with  him  than  against  him.  "After 
all,"  the  reader  might  say,  on  coming  to  that  passage  in 
which  Barry  defends  his  trade  as  a  gambler — a  passage 
which  I  have  quoted  in  speaking  of  the  novel  —  "after 
all,  this  man  is  more  hero  than  scoundrel ;"  so  well  is  the 
burlesque  humour  maintained,  so  well  does  the  scoundrel 
hide  his  own  villany.  I  can  easily  understand  that  to 
some  it  should  seem  too  long  drawn  out.  To  me  it  seems 
to  be  the  perfection  of  humour  —  and  of  philosophy.  If 
such  a  one  as  Barry  Lyndon,  a  man  full  of  intellect,  can 
be  made  thus  to  love  and  cherish  his  vice,  and  to  believe 
in  its  beauty,  how  much  more  necessary  is  it  to  avoid  the 
footsteps  which  lead  to  it  ?  But,  as  I  have  said  above, 
there  is  no  standard  by  which  to  judge  of  the  excellence 
of  the  ludicrous  as  there  is  of  the  sublime,  and  even  the 
realistic. 

No  writer  ever  had  a  stronger  proclivity  towards  paro- 
dy than  Thackeray ;  and  we  may,  I  think,  confess  that 
there  is  no  form  of  literar}^  drollery  more  dangerous.  The 
parody  will  often  mar  the  gem  of  which  it  coarsely  re- 
produces the  outward  semblance.  The  word  "  damaged," 
used  instead  of  "  damask,"  has  destroyed  to  my  ear  for 
ever  the  music  of  one  of  the  sweetest  passages  in  Shake- 
speare. But  it  must  be  acknowledged  of  Thackeray  that, 
fond  as  he  is  of  this  branch  of  humour,  he  has  done  little 
or  no  injury  by  his  parodies.  They  run  over  with  fun, 
but  are  so  contrived  that  they  do  not  lessen  the  flavour  of 
the  original.     I  have  given  in  one  of  the  preceding  chap^ 


192  '  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

ters  a  little  set  of  verses  of  bis  own,  called  The  Willow 
Tree,  and  his  own  parody  on  his  own  work.  There  the 
reader  may  see  how  effective  a  parody  may  be  in  destroy- 
ing the  sentiment  of  the  piece  parodied.  But  in  dealing 
with  other  authors  be  has  been  grotesque  without  being 
sevtfrely  critical,  and  has  been  very  like,  without  making 
ugly  or  distasteful  that  which  he  has  imitated.  No  one 
"who  has  admired  Coningshy  will  admire  it  the  less  because 
of  Codling  shy.  Nor  will  the  undoubted  romance  of  Eu- 
gene Aram  be  lessened  in  the  estimation  of  any  reader  of 
novels  by  the  well-told  career  of  George  de  Barnwell.  One 
may  say  that  to  laugh  Ivanhoe  out  of  face,  or  to  lessen  the 
glory  of  that  immortal  story,  would  be  beyond  the  power 
of  any  farcical  effect.  Thackeray,  in  his  Rowena  mid  Re- 
becca, certainly  had  no  such  purpose.  Nothing  oi  Ivanhoe 
is  injured,  nothing  made  less  valuable  than  it  was  before, 
yet,  of  all  prose  parodies  in  the  language,  it  is  perhaps  the 
most  perfect.  Every  character  is  maintained,  every  inci- 
dent has  a  taste  of  Scott.  It  has  the  twang  of  Ivanhoe 
from  beginning  to  end,  and  yet  there  is  not  a  word  in  it 
by  which  the  author  of  Ivanhoe  could  have  been  offended. 
But  then  there  is  the  purpose  beyond  that  of  the  mere 
parody.  Prudish  women  have  to  be  laughed  at,  and  des- 
potic kings,  and  parasite  lords  and  bishops.  The  ludi- 
crous alone  is  but  poor  fun ;  but  when  the  ludicrous  has  a 
meaning,  it  can  be  very  effective  in  the  hands  of  such  a 
master  as  this. 

"  He  to  die !"  resumed  the  bishop.  "  He  a  mortal  like  to  us ! 
Death  was  not  for  him  intended,  though  communis  omnibtis. 
Keeper,  you  are  irreligious,  for  to  talk  and  cavil  thus  !" 

So  much  I  have  said  of  the  manner  in  which  Thackeray 
did  his  work,  endeavouring  to  represent  human  nature  as 


IX.]     THACKERAY'S  STYLE  AND  MANNER  OF  WORK.     193 

he  saw  it,  so  that  his  readers  should  learn  to  love  what  is 
good,  and  to  hate  what  is  evil.  As  to  the  merits  of  his 
style,  it  will  be  necessary  to  insist  on  them  the  less,  be- 
cause it  has  been  generally  admitted  to  be  easy,  lucid,  and 
grammatical.  I  call  that  style  easy  by  which  the  writer 
has  succeeded  in  conveying  to  the  reader  that  which  the 
reader  is  intended  to  receive  with  the  least  possible  amount 
of  trouble  to  him.  I  call  that  style  lucid  which  conveys  to 
the  reader  most  accurately  all  that  the  writer  wishes  to  con- 
vey on  any  subject.  The  two  virtues  will,  I  think,  be  seen 
to  be  very  different.  An  author  may  wish  to  give  an  idea 
that  a  certain  flavour  is  bitter.  He  shall  leave  a  convic- 
tion that  it  is  simply  disagreeable.  Then  he  is  not  lucid. 
But  he  shall  convey  so  much  as  that,  in  such  a  manner  as 
to  give  the  reader  no  trouble  in  arriving  at  the  conclu- 
sion. Therefore  he  is  easy.  The  subject  here  suggested 
is  as  little  complicated  as  possible ;  but  in  the  intercourse 
which  is  going  on  continually  between  writers  and  read- 
ers, affairs  of  all  degrees  of  complication  are  continually 
being  discussed,  of  a  nature  so  complicated  that  the  inex- 
perienced writer  is  puzzled  at  every  turn  to  express  him- 
self, and  the  altogether  inartistic  writer  fails  to  do  so. 
Who  among  writers  has  not  to  acknowledge  that  he  is 
often  unable  to  tell  all  that  he  has  to  tell  ?  Words  refuse 
to  do  it  for  him.  He  struggles  and  stumbles  and  alters 
and  adds,  but  finds  at  last  that  he  has  gone  either  too  far 
or  not  quite  far  enough.  Tlicn  there  comes  upon  him 
the  necessity  of  choosing  between  two  evils.  He  must 
either  give  up  the  fulness  of  his  thought,  and  content 
himself  with  presenting  some  fragment  of  it  in  that  lucid 
arrangement  of  words  which  he  affects ;  or  he  must  bring 
out  his  thought  with  ambages ;  he  must  mass  his  sen- 
tences inconsequentially;  he  must  struggle  up  hill  almost 

9* 


194  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

hopelessly  witli  his  phrases — so  that  at  the  end  the  reader 
will  have  to  labour  as  he  himself  has  laboured,  or  else  to 
leave  behind  much  of  the  fruit  which  it  has  been  intended 
that  he  should  garner.  It  is  the  ill-fortune  of  some  to  be 
neither  easy  or  lucid ;  and  there  is  nothing  more  wonder- 
ful in  the  history  of  letters  than  the  patience  of  readers 
when  called  upon  to  suffer  under  the  double  calamity.  It 
is  as  though  a  man  were  reading  a  dialogue  of  Plato,  un- 
derstanding neither  the  subject  nor  the  language.  But  it 
is  often  the  case  that  one  has  to  be  sacrificed  to  the  other. 
The  pregnant  writer  will  sometimes  solace  himself  by  de- 
claring that  it  is  not  his  business  to  supply  intelligence  to 
the  reader ;  and  then,  in  throwing  out  the  entirety  of  his 
thought,  will  not  stop  to  remember  that  he  cannot  hope 
to  scatter  his  ideas  far  and  wide  unless  he  can  make  them 
easily  intelligible.  Then  the  writer  who  is  determined 
that  his  book  shall  not  be  put  down  because  it  is  trouble- 
some, is  too  apt  to  avoid  the  knotty  bits  and  shirk  the 
rocky  turns,  because  he  cannot  with  ease  to  himself  make 
them  easy  to  others.  If  this  be  acknowledged,  I  shall  be 
held  to  be  right  in  saying  not  only  that  ease  and  lucidity 
in  style  are  different  virtues,  but  that  they  are  often  op- 
posed to  each  other.  They  may,  however,  be  combined, 
and  then  the  writer  will  have  really  learned  the  art  of 
writing.  Omne  tulit  punctum  qui  miscuit  utile  dulci.  It 
is  to  be  done,  I  believe,  in  all  languages.  A  man  by  art 
and  practice  shall  at  least  obtain  such  a  masterhood  over 
words  as  to  express  all  that  he  thinks,  in  phrases  that  shall 
be  easily  understood. 

In  such  a  small  space  as  can  here  be  allowed,  I  cannot 
give  instances  to  prove  that  this  has  been  achieved  by 
Thackeray.  Nor  would  instances  prove  the  existence  of 
the  virtue,  though  instances  might  the  absence.    The  proof 


IX.]     TUACKERAY'S  STYLE  AND  MANNER  OF  WORK.     195 

lies  in  the  work  of  the  man^s  life,  and  can  only  become 
plain  to  those  who  have  read  his  writings.  I  must  refer 
readers  to  their  own  experiences,  and  ask  them  whether 
they  have  found  themselves  compelled  to  study  passages 
in  Tliackeray  in  order  that  they  might  find  a  recondite 
meaning,  or  whether  they  have  not  been  sure  that  they 
and  the  author  have  toorether  understood  all  that  there 
was  to  understand  in  the  matter.  Have  they  run  back- 
ward over  the  passages,  and  then  gone  on,  not  quite  sure 
what  the  author  has  meant  ?  If  not,  then  he  has  been 
easy  and  lucid.  We  have  not  had  it  so  easy  with  all 
modern  writers,  nor  with  all  that  are  old.  I  may  best, 
perhaps,  explain  my  meaning  by  taking  something  written 
long  ago ;  something  very  valuable,  in  order  that  I  may 
not  damage  my  argument  by  comparing  the  easiness  of 
Thackeray  with  the  harshness  of  some  author  who  has 
in  other  respects  failed  of  obtaining  approbation.  If  you 
take  the  play  of  CymheVine,  you  will,  I  think,  find  it  to  be 
anything  but  easy  reading.  Nor  is  Shakespeare  always 
lucid.  For  purposes  of  his  own  he  will  sometimes  force 
his  readers  to  doubt  his  meaning,  even  after  prolonged 
study.  It  has  ever  been  so  with  Hamlet.  My  readers 
will  not,  I  think,  be  so  crossgrained  with  me  as  to  suppose 
that  I  am  putting  Thackeray  as  a  master  of  style  above 
Shakespeare.  I  am  only  endeavouring  to  explain  by  ref- 
erence to  the  great  master  the  condition  of  literary  pro- 
duction which  he  attained.  Whatever  Thackeray  says,  the 
reader  cannot  fail  to  understand ;  and  whatever  Thackeray 
attempts  to  communicate,  he  succeeds  in  conveying. 

That  he  is  grammatical  I  must  leave  to  my  readers' 
judgment,  with  a  simple  assertion  in  his  favour.  There 
arc  some  who  say  that  grammar  —  by  which  I  mean  ac- 
curacy of  composition,  in  accordance  with  certain  acknowl- 


196  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

edged  rules  —  is  only  a  means  to  an  end;  and  that,  if  a 
writer  can  absolutely  achieve  the  end  by  some  other  mode 
of  his  own,  he  need  not  regard  the  prescribed  means.  If 
a  man  can  so  write  as  to  be  easily  understood,  and  to 
convey  lucidly  that  which  he  has  to  convey  without  ac- 
curacy of  grammar,  why  should  he  subject  himself  to  un- 
necessary trammels  ?  Why  not  make  a  path  for  himself, 
if  the  path  so  made  will  certainly  lead  him  whither  he 
wishes  to  go  ?  The  answer  is,  that  no  other  path  will 
lead  others  whither  he  wishes  to  carry  them  but  that 
which  is  common  to  him  and  to  those  others.  It  is  nec- 
essary that  there  should  be  a  ground  equally  familiar  to 
the  writer  and  to  his  readers.  If  there  be  no  such  com- 
mon ground,  they  will  certainly  not  come  into  full  accord. 
There  have  been  recusants  who,  by  a  certain  acuteness  of 
their  own,  have  partly  done  so  —  wilful  recusants;  but 
they  have  been  recusants,  not  to  the  extent  of  discarding 
grammar — which  no  writer  could  do  and  not  be  altogether 
in  the  dark — but  so  far  as  to  have  created  for  themselves 
a  phraseology  which  has  been  picturesque  by  reason  of  its 
illicit  vagaries ;  as  a  woman  will  sometimes  please  ill-in- 
structed eyes  and  ears  by  little  departures  from  feminine 
propriety.  They  have  probably  laboured  in  their  vocation 
as  sedulously  as  though  they  had  striven  to  be  correct, 
and  have  achieved  at  the  best  but  a  short-lived  success — 
as  is  the  case  also  with  the  unconventional  female.  The 
charm  of  the  disorderly  soon  loses  itself  in  the  ugliness  of 
disorder.  And  there  are  others  rebellious  from  grammar, 
who  are,  however,  hardly  to  be  called  rebels,  because  the 
laws  which  they  break  have  never  been  altogether  known 
to  them.  Among  those  very  dear  to  me  in  English  litera- 
ture, one  or  two  might  be  named  of  cither  sort,  whoso 
works,  though  they  have  that  in  them  which  will  insure  to 


IX.]     THACKERAY'S  STYLE  AND  MANNER  OF  WORK.     197 

them  a  long  life,  will  become  from  year  to  year  less  valu- 
able and  less  venerable,  because  their  authors  have  either 
scorned  or  have  not  known  that  common  ground  of  lan- 
guage on  which  the  author  and  his  readers  should  stand 
together.  My  purport  here  is  only  with  Thackeray,  and  I 
say  that  he  stands  always  on  that  common  ground.  He 
quarrels  with  none  of  the  laws.  As  the  lady  who  is  most 
attentive  to  conventional  propriety  may  still  have  her  own 
fashion  of  dress  and  her  own  mode  of  speech,  so  had 
Thackeray  very  manifestly  his  own  style;  but  it  is  one 
the  correctness  of  which  has  never  been  impugned. 

I  hold  that  gentleman  to  be  the  best  dressed  whose 
dress  no  one  observes.  I  am  not  sure  but  that  the  same 
may  be  said  of  an  author's  written  language.  Only,  where 
shall  we  find  an  example  of  sucli  perfection  ?  Always 
easy,  always  lucid,  always 'correct,  we  may  find  them  ;  but 
who  is  the  writer,  easy,  lucid,  and  correct,  who  has  not 
impregnated  his  writing  with  something  of  that  personal 
flavour  which  we  call  mannerism  ?  To  speak  of  authors 
well  known  to  all  readers — Does  not  The  Rambler  taste  of 
Johnson ;  The  Decline  and  Fall,  of  Gibbon  ;  The  Middle 
Ages,  of  Hallam  ;  The  History  of  England,  of  Macaulay ; 
and  The  Invasion  of  the  Crimea,  of  Kinglake  ?  Do  we 
not  know  the  elephantine  tread  of  The  Saturday,  and  the 
precise  toe  of  The  Spectator?  I  have  sometimes  thought 
that  Swift  has  been  nearest  to  the  mark  of  any — writing 
English  and  not  writing  Swift.  But  I  doubt  whether  an 
accurate  observer  would  not  trace  even  here  the  "mark 
of  the  beast."  Thackeray,  too,  has  a  strong  flavour  of 
Thackeray.  I  am  inclined  to  think  that  his  most  beset- 
ting sin  in  style — the  little  ear-mark  by  which  he  is  most 
conspicuous — is  a  certain  affected  familiarity.  He  in- 
dulges too  frequently  in  little  confidences  with  individual 


198  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

readers,  in  whicli  pretended  allusions  to  himself  arc  fre- 
quent. "  What  would  you  do  ?  what  would  you  say  now, 
if  you  were  in  such  a  position  ?"  he  asks.  He  describes 
this  practice  of  his  in  the  preface  to  Pendennis.  "It  is  a 
sort  of  confidential  talk  between  writer  and  reader.  .  .  . 
In  the  course  of  his  volubility  the  perpetual  speaker  raust 
of  necessity  lay  bare  his  own  weaknesses,  vanities,  peculiari- 
ties." In  the  short  contributions  to  periodicals  on  which 
he  tried  his  'prentice  hand,  such  addresses  and  conversa- 
tions were  natural  and  efficacious ;  but  in  a  larger  work  of 
fiction  they  cause  an  absence  of  that  dignity  to  which  even 
a  novel  may  aspire.  You  feel  that  each  morsel  as  you 
read  it  is  a  detached  bit,  and  that  it  has  all  been  written 
in  detachments.  The  book  is  robbed  of  its  integrity  by  a 
certain  good-humoured  geniality  of  language,  which  causes 
the  reader  to  be  almost  too  much  at  home  with  his  au- 
thor. There  is  a  saying  that  familiarity  breeds  contempt, 
and  I  have  been  sometimes  inclined  to  think  that  our  au- 
thor has  sometimes  failed  to  stand  up  for  himself  with 
sufficiency  of  "  personal  deportment." 

In  other  respects  Thackeray's  style  is  excellent.  As  I 
have  said  before,  the  reader  always  understands  his  words 
without  an  effort,  and  receives  all  that  the  author  has  to 
give. 

There  now  remains  to  be  discussed  the  matter  of  our 
author's  work.  The  manner  and  the  style  are  but  the 
natural  wrappings  in  which  the  goods  have  been  prepared 
for  the  market.  Of  these  goods  it  is  no  doubt  true  that 
unless  the  wrappings  be  in  some  degree  meritorious  the 
article  will  not  be  accepted  at  all;  but  it  is  the  kernel 
which  we  seek,  which,  if  it  be  not  of  itself  sweet  and  di- 
gestible, cannot  be  made  serviceable  by  any  shell,  however 
pretty  or  easy  to  be  cracked.     I  have  said  previously  that 


IX.]     THACKERAY'S  STYLE  AND  MANNER  OF  WORK.     199 

it  is  the  business  of  a  novel  to  instruct  in  morals  and  to 
amuse.  I  will  go  further,  and  will  add,  having  been  for 
many  years  a  most  prolific  writer  of  novels  myself,  that  I 
regard  him  who  can  put  himself  into  close  communication 
with  young  people  year  after  year  without  making  some 
attempt  to  do  them  good  as  a  very  sorry  fellow  indeed. 
However  poor  your  matter  may  be,  however  near  you  may 
come  to  that  "  foolishest  of  existing  mortals,"  as  Carlyle 
presumes  some  unfortunate  novelist  to  be,  still,  if  there  be 
those  who  read  your  works,  they  will  undoubtedly  be  more 
or  less  influenced  by  what  they  find  there.  And  it  is  be- 
cause the  novelist  amuses  that  he  is  thus  influential.  The 
sermon  too  often  has  no  such  effect,  because  it  is  applied 
with  the  declared  intention  of  having  it.  The  palpable 
and  overt  dose  the  child  rejects;  but  that  which  is  cun- 
ningly insinuated  by  the  aid  of  jam  or  honey  is  accepted 
unconsciously,  and  goes  on  upon  its  curative  mission.  So 
it  is  with  the  novel.  It  is  taken  because  of  its  jam  and 
honey.  But,  unlike  the  honest  simple  jam  and  honey  of 
the  household  cupboard,  it  is  never  unmixed  with  physic. 
There  will  be  the  dose  within  it,  either  curative  or  poison- 
ous. The  girl  will  be  taught  modesty  or  immodesty,  truth 
or  falsehood ;  the  lad  will  be  taught  honour  or  dishonour, 
simplicity  or  affectation.  Without  the  lesson  the  amuse- 
ment will  not  be  there.  There  are  novels  which  certain- 
ly can  teach  nothing;  but  then  neither  can  they  amuse 
any  one. 

I  should  be  said  to  insist  absurdly  on  the  power  of  my 
own  confraternity  if  I  were  to  declare  that  the  bulk  of  the 
young  people  in  the  upper  and  middle  classes  receive  their 
moral  teaching  chiefly  from  the  novels  they  read.  Moth- 
ers would  no  doubt  think  of  their  own  sweet  teaching; 
fathers  of  the  examples  which  they  set;  and  schoolmas- 


200  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

ters  of  the  excellence  of  their  instructions.  Happy  is  the 
country  that  has  such  mothers,  fathers,  and  schoolmasters! 
But  the  novelist  creeps  in  closer  than  the  schoolmaster, 
closer  than  the  father,  closer  almost  than  the  mother.  He 
is  the  chosen  guide,  the  tutor  whom  the  young  pupil 
chooses  for  herself.  She  retires  with  him,  suspecting  no 
lesson,  safe  against  rebuke,  throwing  herself  head  and  heart 
into  the  narration  as  she  can  hardly  do  into  her  task-work; 
and  there  she  is  taught — how  she  shall  learn  to  love ;  how 
she  shall  receive  the  lover  when  he  comes;  how  far  she 
should  advance  to  meet  the  joy ;  why  she  should  be  reti- 
cent, and  not  throw  herself  at  once  into  this  new  delight. 
It  is  the  same  with  the  young  man.  though  he  v/ould  be 
more  prone  even  than  she  to  reject  the  suspicion  of  such 
tutorship.  But  he  too  will  there  learn  either  to  speak  the 
truth,  or  to  lie ;  and  will  receive  from  his  novel  lessons  ei- 
ther of  real  manliness,  or  of  that  affected  apishness  and 
tailor-begotten  demeanour  which  too  man}'  professors  of 
the  craft  give  out  as  their  dearest  precepts. 

At  any  rate  the  close  intercourse  is  admitted.  "Where 
is  the  house  now  from  which  novels  are  tabooed  ?  Is  it 
not  common  to  allow  them  almost  indiscriminately,  so  that 
young  and  old  each  chooses  his  own  novel?  Shall  he, 
then,  to  whom  this  close  fellowship  is  allowed — this  inner 
confidence — shall  he  not  be  careful  what  words  he  uses, 
and  what  thoughts  he  expresses,  when  he  sits  in  council 
with  his  young  friend  ?  This,  which  it  will  certainly  be 
his  duty  to  consider  with  so  much  care,  will  be  the  matter 
of  his  work.  We  know  what  was  thought  of  such  matter 
when  Lydia  in  the  play  was  driven  to  the  necessity  of 
flinging  ^^Peregrine  Pickle  under  the  toilet,"  and  thrust- 
ing ^^Lord  Aimwell  under  the  sofa."  AV-?  iave  got  be- 
yond that  now,  and  arc  tolerably  sure  that  our  girls  do  not 


IX.]     THACKERAY'S  STYLE  AND  MANNER  OF  WORK.     201 

hide  tbcir  novels.  The  more  freely  they  are  allowed,  the 
more  necessary  is  it  that  he  who  supplies  shall  take  care 
that  they  are  worthy  of  the  trust  that  is  given  to  them. 

Now  let  the  reader  ask  himself  what  are  the  lessons 
which  Tliackeray  has  taught.  Let  him  send  his  memory 
running  back  over  all  those  characters  of  whom  we  have 
just  been  speaking,  and  ask  himself  whether  any  girl  has 
been  taught  to  be  immodest,  or  any  man  unmanly,  by 
what  Thackeray  has  written.  A  novelist  has  two  modes 
of  teaching — by  good  example  or  bad.  It  is  not  to  be 
supposed  that  because  the  person  treated  of  be  evil,  there- 
fore the  precept  will  be  evil.  If  so,  some  personages  with 
whom  we  have  been  made  well  acquainted  from  our  youth 
upwards  would  have  been  omitted  in  our  early  lessons. 
It  may  be  a  question  whether  the  teaching  is  not  more  ef- 
ficacious which  comes  from  the  evil  example.  -What  story 
was  ever  more  powerful  in  showing  the  beauty  of  feminine 
reticence,  and  the  horrors  of  feminine  evil-doing,  than  the 
fate  of  Effie  Deans  ?  The  Templar  would  have  betrayed  a 
woman  to  his  lust,  but  has  not  encouraged  others  by  the 
freedom  of  his  life.  Yarney  was  utterly  bad — but  though 
a  gay  courtier,  he  has  enticed  no  others  to  go  the  way  that 
he  went.  So  it  has  been  with  Thackeray.  His  examples 
have  been  generally  of  that  kind — but  they  have  all  been 
efficacious  in  their  teaching  on  the  side  of  modesty  and 
manliness,  truth  and  simplicity.  When  some  girl  shall 
have  traced  from  first  to  last  the  character  of  Beatrix, 
what,  let  us  ask,  will  be  the  result  on  her  mind  ?  Beatrix 
was  born  noble,  clever,  beautiful,  with  certain  material  ad- 
vantages, which  it  was  within  her  compass  to  improve  by 
her  nobility,  wit,  and  beauty.  She  was  quite  alive  to  that 
fact,  and  thought  of  those  material  advantages,  to  the  ut- 
ter exclusion,  in  our  mind,  of  any  idea  of  moral  goodness. 


202  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

She  realised  it  all,  and  told  herself  that  that  was  the  game 
she  would  play.  "  Twenty -five !"  says  she;  "and  in  eight 
years  no  man  has  ever  touched  my  heart !"  That  is  her 
boast  when  she  is  about  to  be  married — her  only  boast  of 
herself.  "A  most  detestable  young  woman!"  some  will 
say.  "An  awful  example !"  others  will  add.  Not  a  doubt 
of  it.  She  proves  the  misery  of  her  own  career  so  fully 
that  no  one  will  follow  it.  The  example  is  so  awful  that 
it  will  surely  deter.  The  girl  will  declare  to  herself  that 
not  in  that  way  will  she  look  for  the  happiness  which  she 
hopes  to  enjoy ;  and  the  young  man.  will  say,  as  he  reads 
it,  that  no  Beatrix  shall  touch  his  heart. 

You  may  go  through  all  his  cliaracters  with  the  same 
effect.  Pendennis  will  be  scorned  because  he  is  light; 
AVarrington  loved  because  he  is  strong  and  merciful ;  Dob- 
bin will  be  honoured  because  he  is  unselfish ;  and  the  old 
colonel,  though  he  be  foolish,  vain,  and  weak,  almost  wor- 
shipped because  he  is  so  true  a  gentleman.  It  is  in  the 
handling  of  questions  such  as  these  that  we  have  to  look 
for  the  matter  of  the  novelist — those  moral  lessons  which 
he  mixes  up  with  his  jam  and  his  honey.  I  say  that  with 
Thackeray  the  physic  is  always  curative  and  never  poison- 
ous. He  may  be  admitted  safely  into  that  close  fellow- 
ship, and  be  allowed  to  accompany  the  dear  ones  to  their 
retreats.  The  girl  will  never  become  bold  under  his 
preaching,  or  taught  to  throw  herself  at  men''s  heads.  Nor 
will  the  lad  receive  a  false  flashy  idea  of  what  becomes  a 
youtb,  when  he  is  first  about  to  take  his  place  among  men. 

As  to  that  other  question,  whether  Thackeray  be  amus- 
ing as  well  as  salutary,  I  must  leave  it  to  public  opinion. 
There  is  now  being  brought  out  of  his  works  a  more  splen- 
did edition  than  has  ever  been  produced  in  any  age  or 
any  country  of  the  writings  of  such  an  author.     A  ce^ 


IX.]     THACKERAY'S  STYLE  AND  MANNER  OF  WORK.     203 

tain  fixed  number  of  copies  only  is  being  issued,  and  each 
copy  will  cost  £33  12s.  when  completed.  It  is  under- 
Btood  that  a  very  large  proportion  of  the  edition  has  been 
already  bought  or  ordered.  Cost,  it  will  be  said,  is  a  bad 
test  of  excellence.  It  will  not  prove  the  merit  of  a  book 
any  more  than  it  will  of  a  horse.  But  it  is  proof  of  the 
popularity  of  the  book.  Print  and  illustrate  and  bind  up 
some  novels  how  you  Avill,  no  one  will  buy  them.  Previous 
to  these  costly  volumes,  there  have  been  l^'o  entire  editions 
of  his  works  since  the  author's  death,  one  comparatively 
cheap  and  the  other  dear.  Before  his  death  his  stories  had 
been  scattered  in  all  imaginable  forms.  I  may  therefore 
assert  that  their  charm  has  been  proved  by  their  popularity. 
There  remains  for  us  only  this  question — whether  the 
nature  of  Thackeray's  works  entitle  him  to  be  called  a 
cynic.  The  word  is  one  which  is  always  used  in  a  bad 
sense.  "  Of  a  dog ;  currish,"  is  the  definition  which  we 
get  from  Johnson — quite  correctly,  and  in  accordance  with 
its  etymology.  And  he  gives  us  examples.  "  How  vilely 
does  this  cynic  rhyme,"  he  takes  from  Shakespeare ;  and 
Addison  speaks  of  a  man  degenerating  into  a  cynic.  That 
Thackeray's  nature  was  soft  and  kindly — gentle  almost  to 
a  fault — has  been  shown  elsewhere.  But  they  who  have 
called  him  a  cynic  have  spoken  of  him  merely  as  a  writer 
— and  as  writer  he  has  certainly  taken  upon  hin^self  the 
special  task  of  barking  at  the  vices  and  follies  of  the  world 
around  him.  Any  satirist  might  in  the  same  way  be  call- 
ed a  cynic  in  so  far  as  his  satire  goes.  Swift  was  a  cynic, 
certainly.  Pope  was  cynical  when  he  was  a  satirist.  Ju- 
venal was  all  cynical,  because  he  was  all  satirist.  If  that 
be  what  is  meant,  Thackeray  was  certainly  a  cynic.  But 
that  is  not  all  that  the  word  implies.     It  intends  to  go 

back  beyond  the  work  of  the  man,  and  to  describe  his 
0 


204  ^  THACKERAY.  [chap. 

heart.  It  says  of  any  satirist  so  described  that  he  has 
given  himself  up  to  satire,  not  because  things  have  been 
evil,  but  because  he  himself  has  been  evil.  Hamlet  is  a 
satirist,  whereas  Thersites  is  a  cynic.  If  Thackeray  be 
judged  after  this  fashion,  the  word  is  as  inappropriate  to 
the  writer  as  to  the  man. 

But  it  has  to  be  confessed  that  Thackeray  did  allow  his 
intellect  to  be  too  thoroughly  saturated  with  the  aspect  of 
the  ill  side  of  things.  We  can  trace  the  operation  of  his 
mind  from  his  earliest  days,  when  he  commenced  his  paro- 
dies at  school ;  when  he  brought  out  The  Snob  at  Cam- 
bridge, when  he  sent  Yellowplush  out  upon  the  world  as 
a  satirist  on  the  doings  of  gentlemen  generally ;  when  he 
wrote  his  Catherine,  to  show  the  vileness  of  the  taste  for 
what  he  would  have  called  Newgate  literature;  and  The 
Hoggarty  Diamond,  to  attack  bubble  companies;  and 
Barry  Lyndon,  to  expose  the  pride  which  a  rascal  may 
take  in  his  rascality.  Becky  Sharp,  Major  Pendennis,  Bea- 
trix, both  as  a  young  and  as  an  old  woman,  were  written 
with  the  same  purpose.  There  is  a  touch  of  satire  in 
every  drawing  that  he  made.  A  jeer  is  needed  for  some- 
thing that  is  ridiculous,  scorn  has  to  be  thrown  on  some- 
thing that  is  vile.  The  same  feeling  is  to  be  found  ic 
every  line  of  every  ballad. 

VANITAS  VANITATUM. 

Mcthinks  the  text  is  never  stale, 

And  life  is  every  day  renewing 
Fresh  comments  on  the  old  old  talc, 

Of  Folly,  Fortune,  Glory,  Ruin. 

Ilark  to  the  preacher,  preaching  still ! 

He  lifts  his  voice  and  cries  his  sermon, 
Here  at  St.  Peter's  of  Cornhill, 

As  yonder  on  the  Mount  of  Hermon— 


IX.]     THACKERAY'S  STYLE  AND  MANNER  OF  WORK.     205 

For  you  and  me  to  heart  to  take 

(0  dear  beloved  brother  readers), 
To-day— as  when  the  good  king  spake 

Beneath  the  solemn  Syrian  cedars. 

It  was  just  so  with  him  always.  He  was  "crying  his 
sermon,"  hoping,  if  it  might  be  so,  to  do  something  to- 
wards lesscninix  the  evils  he  saw  around  him.  We  all 
preach  our  sermon,  but  not  always  with  the  same  earnest- 
ness, lie  had  become  so  urgent  in  the  cause,  so  loud  in 
his  denunciations,  that  he  did  not  stop  often  to  speak  of 
the  good  things  around  him.  Now  and  again  he  paused 
and  blessed  amid,  the  torrent  of  his  anathemas.  There 
are  Dobbin,  and  Esmond,  and  Colonel  Newcome.  But  his 
anathemas  are  the  loudest.  It  has  been  so,  I  think,  nearly 
always  with  the  eloquent  preachers. 

I  will  insert  here  —  especially  here  at  the  end  of  this 
chapter,  in  which  I  have  spoken  of  Thackeray's  matter  and 
manner  of  writing,  because  of  the  justice  of  the  criticism 
conveyed — the  lines  which  Lord  Houghton  wrote  on  his 
death,  and  which  are  to  be  found  in  the  February  number 
of  The  Cotiihill  of  1864.  It  was  the  first  number  printed 
after  his  death.  I  would  add  that,  though  no  Dean  ap- 
plied for  permission  to  bury  Thackeray  in  Westminster 
Abbey,  his  bust  was  placed  there  without  delay.  What  is 
needed  by  the  nation  in  such  a  case  is  simply  a  lasting 
memorial  there,  where  such  memorials  are  most  often  seen 
and  most  highly  honoured.  But  we  can  all  of  us  sympa- 
thise with  the  feeling  of  the  poet,  writing  immediately  oa 
the  loss  of  such  a  friend : 

When  one,  whose  nervous  English  verse 

Public  and  party  hates  defied, 
Who  bore  and  bandied  many  a  curse 

Of  angry  times — when  Dryden  died, 


200  THACKERAY.  [chap,  is 

Our  royal  abbey's  Bishop-Dean 

Waited  for  no  suggestive  prayer, 
But,  ere  one  day  closed  o'er  the  scene, 

Craved,  as  a  boon,  to  lay  him  there. 

The  wayward  faith,  the  faulty  life, 

Vanished  before  a  nation's  pain. 
Panther  and  Hi.d  forgot  their  strife, 

And  rival  statesmen  thronged  the  fane. 

0  gentle  censor  of  our  age ! 

Prime  master  of  our  ampler  tongue ! 
"Whose  word  of  wit  and  generous  page 

Were  never  wrath,  except  with  wrong,— = 

Fielding — without  the  manner's  dross, 

Scott — with  a  spirit's  larger  room, 
What  Prelate  deems  thy  grave  his  loss  ? 

What  Halifax  erects  thy  tomb  ? 

But,  may  be,  he — who  so  could  draw 
The  hidden  great — the  humble  wise, 

yielding  with  them  to  God's  good  law, 
Makes  the  Pantheon  where  he  lies. 


THE    END, 


ENGLISH  MEN  OF  LETTERS. 

EDITED   BY  JOHN   MORLEY. 

The  following  Volumes  are  now  ready : 

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EDWARD   GIBBON By  J.  C.  Mobison. 

SIR  WALTER   SCOTT By  R.  H.  Hdtton. 

PERCY  BYSSHE   SHELLEY By  J.  A.  Svmonds, 

DAVID  HUME By  T.  H.  Huxley. 

OLIVER  GOLDSMITH By  William  Black. 

DANIEL  DEFOE By  William  Minto. 

ROBERT  BURNS By  J.  C.  Siiaiup. 

EDMUND  SPENSER By  R.  W.  Cuukou. 

WILLIAM  M.  THACKERAY  By  Anthony  Tbollopk. 

EDMUND  BURKE By  John  Morlky. 

JOHN  MILTON By  Mark  Pattison. 

NATHANIEL  HAWTHORNE By  Henry  James,  Jr. 

ROBERT  SOUTHEY By  E.  Dowden. 

GEOFFREY  CHAUCER By  A.  W.  Ward, 

JOHN  BUNYAN By  J.  A.  Froude. 

WILLIAM  COWPER By  Golbwin  Smith. 

ALEXANDER  POPE By  Leslie  Stefiien. 

LORD  BYRON By  John  Nicuol. 

JOHN  LOCKE By  Thomas  Fowler. 

WILLIAM   WORDSWORTH By  F.  W.  H.  Myers. 

JOHN  DRYDEN By  G.  Saintsbuey. 

WALTER  SAVAGE  LANDOR By  Sidney  Colyin. 

THOMAS  DE  QUINCEY By  David  Massom 

CHARLES  LAMB By  Alfred  Ainqee. 

RICHARD  BENTLEY By  R.  C.  Jkbb. 

CHARLES  DICKENS By  A.  W.  Ward. 

THOMAS  GRAY By  E.  W.  Gosse. 

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HENRY  FIELDING By  Austin  Dobson. 

RICHARD  BRINSLEY  SHERIDAN By  Mrs.  Olipuant. 

JOSEPH  ADDISON By  W.  J.  Courthopk. 

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14  DAY  USE 

RETURN  TO  DESK  FROM  WHICH  BORROWED 


LOAN  DEPT. 


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LD  21-95        (J9096sl0)476-A-32. 


General  Library 

University  of  California 

Berkeley 


RENEWALS  ONLY— TEL.  NO.  642^405  )[ 

This  book  is  due  on  the  last  date  stamped  below,  or 

on  the  date  to  which  renewed. 

Renewed  books  are  subject  to  immediate  recall. 


w. 


1M| 


IB 


1961 


U.C.  BERKELEY  LIBRARIES 


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